


Ten Years Gone

by sleepingspero9



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Ableist Language, Alternate Universe - High School, Angst, Crazy Castiel, M/M, Mystery, Slow Build, but Dean will come around, like so slow it's just boring
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-30
Updated: 2016-09-21
Packaged: 2018-04-18 03:05:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 25,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4689950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleepingspero9/pseuds/sleepingspero9
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>High school au, where Cas suffers religious delusions and maybe has an unhealthy fixation on Dean. Dean tries not to think about it. Most days, he doesn't feel much more sane than Cas anyway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

They were inseparable, ever since Dean could remember.  Granted, his memories of the earliest days were getting harder and harder to piece together; he'd met Castiel while still on training wheels - literally.  He'd admired the dark-haired boy who rode down the sidewalk in front of the Winchester home, balancing perfectly on only two wheels.  He'd watched for a good five minutes before marching up to him and asking to try his bicycle.  
  
"Mum and dad won't let me take my wheels off," he explained when the boy had just stared at him in wide-eyed surprise.  
  
Cas wordlessly climbed off the bike and offered it to Dean.  
  
"Really?!" Dean was taken aback by how easy that was.  Baby Sam never handed anything over once he got his hands on it.  He was still learning to share, Mom and Dad said.  
  
The quiet boy only nodded, his expression so serious Dean felt like they were conducting adult business.  It made him straighten himself, address the boy as he would to a grown-up, holding out his hand to shake.  
  
"I'm Dean," he announced.  When the other boy took his hand, Dean squeezed firmly just like his father taught him.  
  
Finally, the boy opened his mouth and spoke.  "My name is Castiel."  
  
Dean laughed, cheering, "You have a frog in your throat!"  
  
He'd tried the bike right away, promptly falling and scraping his knee - and loving it.  That was the end of that particular memory.  
  
At that point, Dean was certain Cas had family. They lived only a few doors down the street in a grand house, hidden behind tall shrubs and a gate with a speaker.  He was certain that Cas had to ask his older brother for permission for things like visiting Dean's house.  But no matter how hard Dean racked his brain, he couldn't summon an image of this brother.  
  
He'd forced himself to relive memories of running through the gardens on Cas' property, things like sneaking into the kitchen to find cookies.  There might have been staff at the household - Dean thought he remembered a maid serving them iced tea once, but in his mind's eye he couldn't even see her clearly.  
  
As for actual family, Dean couldn't think of a single thing, not even a name.  Not even on the day everything had gone wrong.  He was in third grade; he'd only known Cas for three or four years by then.  Even if Dean didn't trust his adolescent brain to remember shit from pre-k, he trusted his seven year old self, who insisted that Cas lived alone.  
  
His best friend had no family.  Why wasn't that weird?  
  
  


* * *

**_Now_ **

* * *

  
  
Dean had just set the power sander down, stepping back to admire his handiwork, when the garage door banged open behind him.  The sound was dull underneath the blast of Zeppelin from the sound system that was going to be in his car one of these days.  
  
"Dean!  Castiel is here!"  
  
He winced at the sound of his brother's voice, not only because he could hear the bitchface in the kid's tone, but because  _he_  hadn't been here in ages.  Dean had almost started to think they had grown past all this.  
  
He opted to pretend he hadn't heard Sam, a plausible story, what with how loud the current guitar riff was screeching out - but it would only buy him a few precious seconds against the inevitable.  
  
When the music stopped abruptly, he made a show of turning round in surprise.  Sam was standing in the doorway, arms folded and one eyebrow up so high it had climbed right into his fringe.  
  
"It's your boyfriend."  
  
Dean glowered.  "He's not my boyfriend."  He yanked his father's dust mask over his head and angrily tossed it at the workshop counter.  
  
"Sorry.  Your soulmate," Sam mocked, rolling his eyes.  
  
"Dude!"  Dean threw up his hands, exasperated.  
  
"Whatever he is," Sam said, a fleeting smirk pulling his lips.  He thought he was just hilarious.  "He's in the front room, so."  
  
"Yeah, thanks for that, bitch," Dean sneered sarcastically.  
  
"Jerk," Sam replied, a bit too smug for Dean's taste, before turning to leave.  
  
Dean sighed, peeling off his work gloves and sliding out of his boots before climbing the few short steps to the garage's side entrance.  He padded down the hall to the living room, spotting the object of his irritation as soon as he turned the corner.  
  
Cas was perched rigidly on his mother's sofa, staring intently ahead, directly at him, as if he was a little bit angry.  Dean knew better, though; Cas' face just didn't have much range in the way of expression.  
  
"Dean."  Cas said, curtly.  
  
"What are you doing here, Cas?"  Dean sighed.  He almost sat down across from him, to be level with those intense blue eyes, but he thought better of it.  His mom hated when he tracked dirt from the garage into the house.  Especially in the front room.  
  
"I wanted to see you," he answered, too seriously, nodding at Dean.  
  
"Yeah, I figured."  Dean faltered, shifting his weight from one foot to the other.  He didn't want to hover awkwardly for this conversation, but he also didn't want to invite this basket case any further into his house.  
  
It had been so long, Dean couldn't be sure, but it was still very likely that Cas had given his home workers the slip again.  Dean was not eager to see how Mom and Dad would find a way to blame him this time.  
  
"Do you mind if we take this onto the deck? I'm kinda," Dean gestured at himself, and immediately regretted it.  He'd invited Cas to give him a good, long, up-and-down that made him feel like a piece of meat.  
  
Dean cleared his throat loudly.  "My mom likes to keep things tidy in the front room, so.  Uh."  
  
"Of course."  Cas stood gracefully, dipping his head as if in a small bow.  He had a large beige overcoat draped over one arm.  
  
Dean was all too aware of Cas' stare fixed on him as the two made their way across the entrance hall.  They filed past the front staircase and out onto the front porch, where finally Dean could sit and meet him eye to eye. It was a lot colder out here, but there wasn't even snow, really. Just a bit that had melted as soon as it touched the ground.  
  
"So, Cas," Dean paused, not sure how to proceed.  He'd promised himself he'd set better boundaries if this happened again.  Be more assertive.  But now that it came down to it...  
  
"I thought you were doing better," he sighed.  Damn it.  He'd gone for the pity tone.  _For fuck's sake, Dean_.  
  
"I am."  Cas replied eagerly.  His tone was flat, his face stoic as ever, but Dean could tell by the hitch in his breath, by the slight perk in his posture, that Cas was bubbling, on the verge of starting one of his rants.  
  
Dean cut him off before he could start, trying to channel all the sternness he had in him.  He asked pointedly, "Then should you really be here?"  
  
"I wanted..." Cas stopped, broke eye contact with Dean for the first time.  He cast his gaze down onto the garden table between them.  "No," he said in defeat.  
  
"No," Dean iterated, "that's right."  He felt like an asshole, talking to Cas like he was some autist he'd caught digging in a garbage can.  
  
"Are you going to call them?" Cas stared downward, dejected.  
  
"Aw, hell Cas.  Of course I'm not," Dean sighed.  
  
Cas glanced back up with a small smile.  Well, what would be a small smile on a normal person - it was huge in terms of Castiel expression.  
  
Dean groaned and rubbed his face, mostly to hide from that hopeful gaze.  "You're going to be the death of me, buddy."  
  
But Cas stood suddenly.  "I'm going to go," he said, his tone flat, but that smile still in place.  "I'm going to go, and you're going to see."  
  
"See what?  You leaving?  Do you even have bus fare, Cas?"  
  
"It's a surprise," Cas said, a little breathy in his excitement.  
  
"How -"  
  
Cas was already across the porch and strolling down their front steps.  
  
"Cas?  How is bus fare a surprise!?" Dean called after him.  
  
"It wouldn't be a surprise if I told you," Castiel shouted, still marching away.  
  
"Cas!"  
  
Dean contemplated chasing after him as he watched Cas' form retreat across the yard.  He hesitated until Cas reached the gates, weighing the chances that Cas was going to go do something potentially dangerous against the chances that Dean could ever stop him from doing anything once he had his mind set on it.  And leaving so abruptly was not like Cas at all; it usually took two men and a van to remove him after he'd found his way here.  
  
He was definitely up to something.  Dean had rarely seen him so determined.  
  
Cas pulled on his overcoat and slipped through the bars of the front gate without so much as a glance back at Dean.  Dean felt himself let go of a breath he didn't know he was holding.  Whatever Cas had planned, he was gone now.  
  
Dean trudged back to the garage with a weight on his shoulders, an uneasy feeling.  It's not that he didn't trust Cas - he did, absolutely.  But that was the problem.  Trusting Cas' judgement had gotten him into trouble too many times.  
  
_It's been two years since the last time_ , Dean reminded himself.  He really wanted to believe Cas was doing better.  
  
Dean went back to the shell of a car his dad had given him to work on, spent the afternoon sanding it down and contemplating his options.  Basically, to tell or not to tell.  
  
Isn't that what it always came down to?  
  
"So, Cas came by today," he heard himself say casually at the dinner table that night.  Apparently, he'd chosen to tell.  Like a good little boy.  
  
Dean bit down on the inside of his cheek, as if to silence that taunting voice in his head.  
  
His parents stopped and looked over at him right away.  Sam busied himself squishing peas with his fork so that when their father glanced at him he could avoid looking guilty.  So Sam hadn't said anything, loyal as ever.  And it was supposed to be Dean who was Cas' best friend.  
  
But Dad wouldn't let Sam off the hook that easy.  It was almost as if he enjoyed picking fights with his younger son.  He spoke in a warning tone, frowning.  "Sam."  
  
Sam looked up, glanced from his father to his mother, then shrugged.  "I didn't know," he said sullenly.  
  
"He didn't," Dean interjected, drawing all eyes to himself again.  He didn't dare glance at his brother in case he gave Sam away.  "Cas only stopped by for a few minutes and then he was gone."  
  
"Gone?" his father repeated, skeptical.  
  
"They finally realised where to find him," his mother said with a smile.  Trying to make light of the conversation.  It warmed Dean's heart.  
  
"No," he shook his head.  "He just  _left_."  
  
Everyone, even Sam, was surprised at that.  "Where did he go?" he asked, his eyebrows disappearing up under his bangs.  
  
"Home," Dean said, mentally backpedalling as fast as he could.  Where did he think this would go?  Of course they'd call this in.  Dean wanted to kick himself.  
  
"You talked to him?" his father pressed.  "You know he made it home?"  
  
"Yes sir," Dean said automatically.  It wasn't true.  He'd sent Cas an email, their main form of communication, which he still had yet to reply to.  Dean had watched his phone obsessively ever since, waiting for any message alerts.  
  
But what he said was, "Just got off the phone with him."  
  
Now the lie was out there.  Dean prayed that Cas hadn't already gone caused a scene that would out him any time soon.  All he really needed was to make it until tomorrow morning.  
  
They seemed to accept this.  Mom, of course, praised Cas' progress, and Dad didn't take long to change the subject to cars.  Wanted to make sure Dean had finished his task of stripping all the paint on that Impala body.  He always said rewards had to be properly earned, so it was his approval that made Dean gush a little when he suggested black for the new colour.  
  
But his father also seemed pleased with this news of Cas.  Dean knew that they both still thought of him more than they let on.  Dad was secretly just as frustrated as any of them that they could never do anything for poor Cas.  
  
It was Sam who saw through Dean's act, cornered him later that night while Dean was packing.  
  
"He hasn't replied to your email, has he?"  
  
Dean glanced up from where he was trying to zip a pocket full of socks.  Sam was leaning against his door frame, his arms folded and his gaze disapproving.  
  
Dean rolled his eyes for show.  "Don't you have to get ready or something?  We leave at balls o'clock tomorrow, dude."  
  
"I’m serious."  The scowl was audible.  
  
He sighed.  "No, okay?  He hasn't."  He turned his attention back to his luggage, pulling all his socks out again.  
  
"What if he's- "  
  
"He's not."  
  
There was an awkward silence, the bitchface radiating off of Sam even as Dean refused to look at him.  He continued packing his socks away, stuffing them into any space he could find between his other clothes.  
  
Sam inhaled sharply as if about to speak, but he decided against whatever it was and let the air out in a hiss instead.  God, he was so annoying.  Dean slammed his suitcase shut.  
  
"I'll go check the house," he muttered under his breath, silently daring Sam to ask him to repeat himself.  
  
"I'm just- "  
  
"Worried, yeah," Dean interrupted, heavy with sarcasm.  He pinned a glare on his brother.  "Cas is just a delusional wandering around in the night.  I better go wrestle him into a straight jacket."  
  
"Dean," Sam chided.  "You're not really expecting him to be there, right?"  
  
"For fuck's sake, no, Sam!  I'm not hiding him over there!"  
  
"I didn't say you were."  
  
"Don't say anything then, okay? Just - just piss off already."  
  
Dean dismissed him with an angry wave, turning his attention back to his luggage.  He opened it and pretended to rearrange things until he heard his brother wander off.  
  
Sam might have breathed an apology before leaving.  He could go fuck himself, though.  
  
Dean made an honest attempt to finish packing.  Frustrated with how little space he had taken up in his suitcase so far, he moved to his closet and flicked the light on.  He stood there, glaring at a row of t-shirts, not touching one of them.  
  
He rarely got to wear anything he liked while at school, anyway.  When he wasn’t in class, he was either lazing around in dorm or hitting the gym.  It wasn’t often that he blew all his responsibilities as a ‘Winchester legacy’ and fucked off into the city with a fake ID - and he’d already accounted for those nights, anyway.  His favourite jeans, boots, a leather jacket, that was all he needed.  
  
He glanced back at the half-full luggage, and felt a second wave of irritation.  The damn thing had been full to bursting on his way home for winter break.  He’d definitely forgotten  _something_.  
  
After another five minutes of glowering over shoes that he couldn’t imagine wearing on the odd weekend off, Dean had nothing in hand but an extra jacket.  He stomped over to his suitcase and gave up with a growl, kicking it.  Instead of packing the jacket, he pulled it on.  
  
This was all Sam’s fault.  Now that he’d gone and said it, Dean wouldn’t be able to focus until he’d cleared the property.  He headed downstairs for the backyard door, trying to be inconspicuous so he wouldn’t have to explain himself to either of his parents.  Thankfully, Dad seemed to be in his study on the other side of the house, and Mom was busy in the kitchen.  
  
As luck would have it, Sam was waiting for him at the back door.  He was kneeling in the boot room, making a big act of tying his shoes, when Dean came around the corner.  Their eyes met automatically.  Dean felt about ready to punch him.  
  
“ _You are not coming_ ,” Dean hissed, stepping in close so he could whisper.  
  
“Dean- ”  
  
“I fuckin’ told you I’d do it.”  
  
“ _Dean_ ,” Sam insisted.  
  
Then Dean realised that Sam was holding something up, waving it at him.  A red leash.  He glanced down, and sure enough Sam’s dopey golden retriever was sitting patiently at the end of the line.  
  
“I’m just taking Bones out.”  
  
“Right,” Dean grumbled, disoriented.  He still wanted to be angry.  “Just don’t follow me, got it?”  
  
“Loud and clear,” Sam grunted.  
  
Dean waited, watching his brother pointedly until Sam took the hint and exited first.  He followed, frowning all the way down the drive, trying to pretend Sam wasn’t there.  
  
Sam made the five minute walk as awkward as possible, by constantly looking over his shoulder as if he was about to speak.  Dean had to motion for silence a few times by putting a finger to his lips - the last time, when they reached the gate, he opted instead for a throat-slitting gesture.  Sam seemed to find this offensive; that was okay because Dean found his face offensive.  
  
Finally, they parted ways, as Sam took his dog in the direction of the small wooded park at the center of their neighbourhood.  Dean’s route was more roundabout; he had to turn up a smaller street for quite a ways before stopping.  Daylight was mostly gone by now, and the narrow street just made it that much darker.  It was lined with walls of shrubbery and tall trees that reached toward each other to obscure any view of the towering homes beyond them.  
  
Dean marched along the length of one overgrown privacy hedge, feeling the branches as he passed and inspecting the roots at his feet as he stepped over them.  It was subtle, but he found what he was looking for right away: the roots of a great weeping willow that creeped out from under the brush, interrupting the line of the hedge.  


 

* * *

**_Then_ **

* * *

  
  
“I’m not allowed outside,” Castiel whispered conspiratorially.  “But Brother doesn’t know about  _this_.”  
  
He grabbed a fistful of the shrubbery and pulled a branch aside, stepping up to press his body against the hedge.  Dean marvelled as the boy slipped right into the bush, disappearing into a space so narrow he never would have seen it otherwise.  
  
“Awesome!” Dean exclaimed.  
  
He quickly followed, pushing himself forward with his eyes scrunched shut.  When he opened them again, he was already through the other side.  He blinked up at his new friend, noticing that they were shaded by a wide tree that draped its leaves toward the ground.  They fell like a curtain all around.  
  
Castiel grabbed his hand, leading him out and into a beautiful park.  They carefully treaded across a flower bed until they made it onto a stone path.  Dean could see that the path lead down to a huge gazebo with a shiny glass top, and all around the back of the garden, where they had snuck in.  But he was more preoccupied with what lay at the farthest end of the path.  
  
Up, past more flowers and lines of smaller garden trees, past where it all gave way to encircle a great sculptured fountain, was the biggest mansion Dean had ever seen.  Sure, he’d known that his own house was rather small in this neighbourhood, but now he wondered what lay behind many of the other tall gates he’d biked past day after day.  
  
Castiel was trying to pull him up that way, but Dean just stood and stared.  
  
“Is that your house?” he whispered.  
  
“Yes,” Castiel said, annoyed.  He was tugging at Dean’s arm to get him to start moving again.  
  
“So this is your backyard?” Dean asked, rooted to the spot.  He turned to look at the fancy, rounded gazebo.  
  
“Yes.”  Castiel said again.  He stopped and glanced around, too.  “Our last house was more fun, but Brother says we’re too close to the city to keep horses here.”  
  
“Horses,” Dean repeated, impressed.  That did sound more fun.  
  
Castiel tightened his grip on Dean’s hand and pulled again.  “But this house has a secret elevator!”  
  
Dean felt his eyes widen.  A secret elevator also sounded fun.  
  
“Okay.”  
  
They tried to run most of the way, but soon enough Dean had to catch his breath.  When he came across a pretty white bench, he slowed down.  Castiel didn’t notice, running ahead.  
  
“Cas!” he huffed, causing the other boy to stop and turn around.  
  
Castiel just pointed at himself in confusion, as if to ask whether Dean was talking to him.  
  
“Can we wait a minute?” Dean called out, dropping himself onto the bench without waiting for a reply.  
  
Castiel walked back to sit next to him.  “My name isn’t ‘Cas’,” he said.  
  
“It’s called a nickname, dummy,” Dean sighed, leaning back and watching the sky.  “My baby brother is named ‘Samuel’, but no one actually calls him that.”  
  
“They don’t?”  
  
“Nope.  It’s just Sam.”  
  
Castiel hummed thoughtfully.  “Cas.  I like it.”  
  
Dean just chuckled.  Who had never heard of a nickname before?  
  
When they made it up to the house, Dean started towards the large entrance, but Cas reached for his elbow, making him pause.  He shook his head, holding a finger to his lips and lead Dean around to the end of the building, on the side that was tallest.  
  
When they rounded the corner, he explained, “There’s an alarm, so we’d get in trouble.”  
  
“Why is the alarm on during the day?”  
  
Cas smiled a little smile.  “So Brother will know if I leave the house.”  
  
Dean realised that they were misbehaving then.  He grinned.  “How did you get out?”  
  
Cas pointed to a small window that rested on the ground.  “When Gabriel was here, he broke the bug screen so you can open this side of the window.  See, the alarm is only on that side.”  There was a tiny white box in one corner of the sliding window pane.  
  
“Wow,” Dean mused, watching as Cas pressed his hands against the glass, trying to push it to the side.  When it didn’t budge, Dean moved forward to help.  
  
Together, they managed to slide the window over.  Dean wasn’t quite ready for it, and he fell on his butt.  Cas jumped in surprise, but when they made eye contact he just laughed.  
  
Dean didn’t even mind, because it was the first time he’d heard Cas laugh.  Besides, he helped him back up right away.  
  
“Okay, watch me first.  You have to be careful,” Cas warned.  
  
Dean just nodded as Cas backed up and lowered himself feet first through the window.  
  
“There’s a shelf here, so you have to climb down,” Cas instructed, before disappearing entirely inside.  
  
Dean dropped to his knees to peek inside before he tried.  The room inside was much lower than he expected, and Dean suddenly felt like he was very high up.  It was a basement room, obviously for laundry, but it was much bigger than the laundry room at home.  There was a row of machines instead of just two, and Cas was stepping down on top of one of them.  
  
Once he had both feet firmly under him, he looked up at Dean.  “Your turn.”  
  
If Cas could do it, so could he.  Dean took a deep breath and pulled his feet forward.  He didn’t bother turning around like Cas did, and dropped himself onto the top of the shelf too quickly.  
  
“Dean!”  
  
He heard the other boy gasp as the whole unit shook, and he clutched the windowsill.  He refused to make any scared noise, he didn’t want to look like a baby, but he couldn’t help shutting his eyes tight.  
  
But it was over quickly.  The shelf stood sturdy again, and he opened his eyes to see Cas glaring at him.  
  
“I told you to be careful,” he whispered.  
  
Dean’s heart was fluttering, but he shrugged to look like he didn’t care.  “Move over,” he said as he went to crouch at the edge.  
  
This time he did turn around so he could hold on tight to the top of the shelf until he felt something solid under his feet.  He dropped himself down beside Cas.  He was still glaring.  
  
“It wasn’t so bad.”  
  
“You’re my only friend, Dean.  I don’t want you to get hurt,” Cas replied, too seriously.  It made Dean feel weird and he had to look away.  
  
“Okay, I’ll be careful,” he said, staring at his feet.  
  
“Okay.”  
  
They recovered from the moment quickly, and climbed down from the washing machines together.  Cas lead him over to the other end of the room, where there were a couple long countertops.  Mounted on the wall beside them was a little steel door with a panel of buttons.  He dragged over a small, single-step ladder and jumped up to open the door.  It opened bottom to top instead of side to side.  
  
“This goes up to the kitchen,” Cas was saying excitedly.  “And after that, to the bedrooms.  Even Gabriel never knew about this.  He said it was just a laundry chute”  
  
“How does it work?”  
  
“It’s just like an elevator!  Last time I put my tea inside and I could send it all the way upstairs.”  
  
Dean climbed up next to him to get a better look at the buttons.  He knew his numbers, but there were words he couldn’t read.  
  
“This is B, for basement,” Cas explained, showing the bottom one.  “M, for middle, and then numbers for upstairs.  The black one here lights up when it’s going.”  
  
“Can it send people too?”  Dean asked, angling his neck to see how tall it was inside.  It was large metal box, big enough for him to stand in for sure.  
  
“Yes, you just need someone to push the button after it’s closed.  Do you wanna try sending me up first?”  
  
“Yeah, okay,” Dean grinned.

 

* * *

**_Now_ **

* * *

  
  
Unfortunately, it had been many years since Dean made the attempt at the secret backyard entrance - Dean was more than twice the size now.  He pressed himself between the hedges while holding his forearms over his head and got a faceful of branches anyway.  He winced when they scratched around his eyes, so he simply shut them tight and pushed forward.  There was a crunching sound in all directions as some of the more brittle branches broke against his body.  
  
After a bit of undignified wiggling, Dean made it through to the other side.  He mussed his hair to shake out any leaves or twigs and made his way out from under the sweeping willow tree.  
  
The garden was a ruin.  A tall, weedy grass had taken most of the landscape so it was hardly recognizable.  Fortunately, the elegant, glass-domed pavilion remained intact, though weighed with a vine plant that twisted arounds its pillars, and beyond the rest was the small mansion that Dean sought.  
  
The yard sprawled for over an acre, and he had to pick his way through the overgrown remains of the garden, so by the time he reached the main building it was almost pitch black outside.  The house loomed above him, several steep points of the roof rising out of the dark.  It looked more like a haunted house than anything else, but despite the ghosts it held for Dean he could only gaze at it fondly.  He couldn’t stop from attributing some of its former glory to the abandoned mansion in front of him.  
  
The windows were all just black squares set into the buildings; none of the lights were on.  That was a good thing.  
  
_No_ , Dean thought,  _they must have cut the power years ago._   Wouldn’t it be just his luck that Cas decided to use candles and accidentally started a fire tonight, burning down his own inheritance.  Adding arson to his list of offences, that’d be good fun.  
  
If the power was off, the alarm system would be, too.  But Dean couldn't just chance that, so he made his way around to the right wing, where he knew there was a basement window that wouldn't trigger an alarm.  Something Cas had rigged, to get out from under his brother's thumb.  Dean held his breath, constantly glancing around to make certain no one was here, until he found it.  
  
Sure enough, when he crouched down to inspect it, there was still a missing screen on the one side of the window.  There was only one sensor, on the opposite pane.  Dean smirked despite himself.  
  
It was a much tighter squeeze than he remembered, but he quickly checked inside with the light of his cellphone to make sure the way was clear.  It was.  The laundry room inside was disturbingly empty, but at least this way Dean had enough space to jump down to the floor.  
  
He did, swiftly, and landed with a thud that echoed eerily in the dark basement.  He paused to listen, out of habit, before reminding himself that the place was empty.  
  
There was no furniture, although the machines all seemed to be still in place.  At least, where they used to be there were large, laundry-machine sized shapes covered in white sheets.  The doorway was dark, so Dean turned the flashlight of his phone back on, which reflected from the white walls and ceiling effectively to illuminate the whole room.  
  
At the end of the long room, the small round window on the dumb waiter’s door caught the light and drew his eye.  It had been a long time since Dean had spent the afternoon riding up and down the small lift with Cas, hoping the household staff wouldn’t catch them at it.  
  
It was another one of those memories that Dean questioned, because there seemed to be no trace of anyone having worked here, and he couldn’t summon the image of any person in particular.  Maybe he had just assumed that there were workers in the building.  Maybe there had never been anyone at all, and Dean had spent his time here hiding from no one.  
  
He didn’t want to think about that now, and turned away to head for the door.  Navigating through the basement to the staircase was less difficult than he’d imagined, mostly because a good portion of the furniture was gone.  What was left was blanketed with more of those white furniture covers that didn't do much to ease the haunted house vibes.  
  
Despite the fact that all the residents of the house - save for Cas of course - had apparently vanished, Dean couldn't think of the place as anything tragic or creepy.  It was the stuff of ghost stories, but all Dean knew of these halls were fun childhood memories.  Running around, not getting in trouble when they very much should have...  
  
Upstairs was more of the same.  Dean hadn't been inside since he was maybe seven years old.  There were the times that Cas had been found here, when everyone had been at a complete loss a to how he'd gotten inside, but Dean had never been with him then.  
  
So his memories of the grand entrance hall were filled with light, and landing tables always decorated with fresh flowers, expensive art mounted on every wall.  Dean remembered a vase as tall as he had been, at the age of six, that he had knocked over and shattered when sliding down the staircase from the upper floor.  Cas must have taken the fall for that one, because Dean sure as hell didn't.  
  
There was no hint of all that now.  A single table, or what could have been a table, stood long and empty under another sheet.  The intricate glass-stained windows over the door were darkened by the night, reflecting dim in the pale light from his phone.  
  
Dean couldn't help but think that this was what Cas had seen, last time when he ran away from the home and snuck back in here.  Shadows and emptiness.  
  
He cleared his throat, trying to set himself back on task, and called out.  
  
" _Hello?!_ "  
  
It echoed up the grand staircase.  
  
" _Cas!  Are you in here?_ "  
  
He wandered through the kitchen, the dining hall, the conference room, shouting as he went.  Everything was covered in white, silent.  The tiny chapel in the right wing was thoroughly empty, without its pews even.  
  
So he made his way back and up the front staircase, talking loudly still as if Cas were actually here.  Just playing a good old game of hide and seek.  Maybe the sound of his own voice was a little comforting over the ominous sound of his solitary footfalls.  It felt scandalous, meandering through the mansion with his boots still on.  
  
" _Cas!  It's me.  It's Dean._ "  
  
The study didn't look the same without the rows of shelves of books.  The walls were empty without any portraits on them.  There was another large room where Dean couldn't even recall what it might have been once.  Maybe he'd simply never been inside.  There was a collection of unrecognizable shapes all under covers, pushed to one side of the room.  But, as he expected, no Cas anywhere.  
  
So on he went, back to the stairs and up another flight.  A hall of bedrooms lined up in front of him, dark and quiet just like the rest of the house.  They must have been guest rooms.  Dean didn't remember any of them clearly until he reached the end, where he had to cross a landing that overlooked the stairs and the great hall.  
  
There was a big master bedroom, with heavy wooden double doors, that Dean knew for sure he'd never passed through.  This must have been  _his_.  Michael's.  The man Dean was most convinced he should remember.  Michael Celestine had owned the house, on paper, and he had been the only contact anyone could find in Cas' records at the school.  His eldest brother, the social workers said.  
  
As for Cas, he never said anything about him.  
  
Dean paused respectfully before pushing through.  Inside he glanced around and noted only that there was an adjoining dressing room and bathroom, with a balcony on the far end.  A large four-poster was taken apart and barely covered, some other random pieces gathered in the corner together under one sheet.  No Cas.  
  
The last room Dean checked was the only one he could imagine finding Cas in.  His old bedroom.  The farthest, at the end of the landing, the entrance to Cas' room was tucked away and barely noticeable.  Dean felt a lump in his throat when his hand fell on the doorknob, and he swallowed around it.  Something made him knock before he pushed forward.  
  
"Cas?" he asked, his voice annoyingly gentle.  
  
This room was the most familiar.  The roof was slanted unlike any of the others, and the rounded sitting window was just too distinctive not to remember.  The floor stretched out empty in front of him, too big now.  Cas' bed had also been taken apart, pushed against the wall with everything else and covered from view.  
  
"Cas.  Are you here?" Dean sighed.  He knew he wasn't.  Had he been hoping for anything else?  
  
He found himself at the window, leaning forward and gazing out over the dark and wild garden below.  When he turned, his foot hit something soft and made him glance down.  
  
It was a beanbag, right at the edge of the gathering of furniture so it was just visible under the sheet.  It seemed so out of place, until Dean realised - it was where he used to sit.  It used to be under the window sill, where Cas liked to read, long and boring hardcovers without pictures in them.  Dean had joined him when he'd decided Cas needed an education in comic books.  They must have wasted days just hanging out, being complete nerds.  
  
He'd never seen Cas use the beanbag - even as a six year old, he just seemed too dignified.  He wondered whether Cas ever sat in it while Dean was away.  All alone in this giant house.  
  
It just didn't make sense.  There  _must_  have been other people living here.  People Dean couldn't remember.  
  
But he'd sworn up and down that there wasn't.  _There's never anyone at Cas' house_ , he had insisted.  It's all he could seem to say.  
  
He left quickly, nearly jogging through the house and refraining from looking at any more.  It was too sobering.  These were things he hadn't ever revisited, after everything that happened.  He couldn't even remember the last time he'd pondered on the name Michael.  
  
And Dean hadn't even expected to find Cas here tonight anyway; now he was just annoyed that Sam had the balls to ask him to come.  He should have known better.  
  
Dean almost tripped in his haste down the basement stairs, gripping the rail to keep himself upright and almost dropping his phone.  Luckily, he made it outside barely two minutes later, hoisting himself up onto the windowsill and scrabbling outside as if someone was chasing him.  
  
He secured the window back in place and jogged away - but by the time he reached the garden he was flat out running.  He found what remained of the cobblestone path that lead to the willow out back.  The trees and shrubs, the fountain statue at the center of the garden, they were all just indiscernible dark shapes that loomed around him.  He raced past them, sprinting all the way home.  
  
Dean had always thought of everything that had happened in terms of what Cas lost.  What  _Dean_  missed, there was no room for that.  That his best friend was taken away, that paled in comparison to Cas losing everyone and everything he'd ever known.  Cas never talked about his trauma, but they'd kept him on a cocktail of meds ever since.  
  
Dean, he was just fine.  
  
When he finally made it back home, he noticed his bedroom light was on.  Hopefully that didn't mean his parents had noticed his absence.  He kicked off his boots as quietly as he could, stalking through the house without using the flashlight.  The domestic, crowded Winchester home was such a contrast to the Celestines' big empty halls that it made Dean shudder.  
  
Upstairs, it was Sam in his room.  The kid had dozed off in an armchair, but he startled when Dean walked in.  
  
"Dean," he said, wiping sleepily at the corner of his mouth.  "Was he there?"  
  
"Of course not, you dork.  I told you," Dean replied gruffly.  It did warm his heart that Sammy cared so much, but he'd never say so out loud.  
  
"You sure?  It's a big house, isn't it?" Sam yawned.  
  
He'd really never been inside, though back in the day it had been an argument between them.  Dean was shocked to realise that of all his friends, he was the only one who'd ever been inside Cas' house.  
  
"Yes, I checked everywhere.  You can go  _to bed_  now."  Dean jerked his thumb in the direction of the door.  "Out."  
  
Sam rose, still rubbing at his face and blabbering on monotonously. "I guess he really did go home.  That's great news."  
  
Dean chuckled.  "Goodnight, Sam."  
  
"G'night, Dean."  
  
Finally,  Dean dropped himself onto his own bed, fully clothed.  With the lights still on, he stared at the ceiling and listened to Sam crossing the hall and opening his own door.  
  
He didn't remember sleeping, but the morning came way too fast for him to have been wholly awake.  He felt like the living dead when the alarm clock dragged him back to consciousness.  
  
Dean rolled himself over to reach for the thing, to make all that noise stop.  The silence wasn't much of a relief, though, because he knew he had a long day in front of him now.  Groggily, he pulled his phone towards him, checking for notifications out of habit.  
  
Still nothing from Cas.  
  
_Where are you, buddy_?


	2. Chapter 2

When he was eleven, Cas fell in love with oil painting. Within four years he was able to reproduce the work of renaissance masters. Of course, he tended towards religious classics.

It wasn't the first time he'd fixated on a single discipline: when he was eight he was obsessed with Tolkien and Old English, closely followed by an all-consuming study of Latin. During the short time he lived with the Winchesters, he filled their home with every form of origami imaginable, and he was barely seven.

The social workers and therapists had sometimes used the word autistic, but Dean never did. Cas was simply in a class all his own, there was nothing else to it.

While Dean had always thought of Cas as a nerd, for his habit of studying in excess, this was the first of Cas' talents that made his jaw drop. He didn't even believe it at first; he probably could have avoided a lot of trouble if he did.

It was a Friday, a long weekend, and a good portion of the student body had gone into the city for the night. Dean was not so lucky. His grades in math had dropped low enough for Coach Ackers to pull him from next week's game.

A couple of his teammates had the same problem; Roy and Walt for sure, maybe even Aiden. None of them were dumb, but Letters Academy was very concerned with reputation.

His dormmate Richie was gone, though, so Dean had their room to himself. A small comfort. He was doing homework at his desk when there was a knock at his window. He knew who it was before he even turned.

"The hell is wrong with you!" Dean shouted, after opening the window. They all would have been better off if he had just left it closed.

Cas frowned and paused in the act of climbing inside. "You are not happy to see me," he concluded.

"Not happy? Putting it mild, dude!" A cold wind was drafting through the window, and it made Dean shudder.

"What have I done?" Cas implored, hurt written across his face.

"What, do you have selective memory?" Dean fumed, dropping himself back into his seat and glaring. He folded his arms in defense from the cold Cas was letting in.

Cas just stared at him, not moving an inch, no doubt deliberating the depth of Dean's question. Dean rolled his eyes when it occurred to him that the question was maybe loaded for a drama queen like Cas.

"You know what I mean - anyway are you going to come in or are you trying to heat the whole green belt?"

Cas jolted into action, chuting himself through the window. He was in all black, and carrying a backpack with him.

"I am sorry, Dean," he mumbled, quickly pulling the window down behind him.

“ ‘I’m sorry’ doesn’t get Gordon off my back.”

“Is he giving you trouble? I will deal with him,” Cas straightened up, as if ready to fight on the spot.

“No - _dude_ -” Dean groaned in frustration. “He’s not even here, and besides, you’re the problem. Spouting all that gay stuff during your last visit? Right in front of the new kid?”

Cas tilted his head. “Ennis Roth did not strike me as homophobic.”

Dean threw up his hands. “This is like talking to a brick wall.”

Cas was clearly still confused, but he was smart enough to know that his current attitude was stressing Dean out. He lowered himself to sit at the foot of Richie’s bed, mulling over Dean’s complaints.

Dean decided to help him out. “Ennis thinks we’re a couple. And Gordon is getting a kick out of it. Making me out to be a gay predator.”

He looked personally affronted. “You are not a _predator_ -”

“Yeah, or gay, now why would Ennis think that?” Dean interjected sarcastically.

Cas quieted. “He misunderstood me.”

“Really? Don’t you think maybe ‘soulmate' is a pretty strong word?”

He was still not on the same page. He frowned. “Dean. Our bond deserves strong words.”

“Argh!” Dean covered his face, giving up.

* * *

 

**_Now_ **

* * *

The morning was chaotic, a flurry of mothering - Dean could bet that his mom would try to count every pair of underwear he'd packed if he let her. Hell, she'd be ecstatic to go ahead and pack them all herself, she thought he had zero grasp on the concept of school being farther north and therefore colder. As if he hadn't just come home _from_ the school and left his warmest clothes behind in the first place. He blamed Sam, who was the more complacent son, and who was more of a morning person anyway. He didn't mind her trying to feed him a trucker's breakfast when he had fifteen minutes to make a flight.

Dean just wanted black coffee and silence. If he was sullen on the way there, he more than made up for it with generous hugs at the airport.

He was able to sleep for the one hour of the flight, which only made him more groggy. It was his own choice to fly in the morning instead of the day before - he'd never had a problem walking off the plane and into class. Then again, he'd never gone exploring on his own in that stupid manor, either, so that was probably to blame.

As it was, Dean managed to go through the motions. He was lucky Richie wasn't in their dorm room when he arrived, so he was able to head straight to homeroom without doing social pleasantries. A few of his friends came in and demanded his attention before Mr Magnus showed up and called for blissful silence, and Dean was able to doze again so long as he looked alive.

It all caught up with him during first break, after he had ditched Ennis and Gordon under the guise of getting something from his locker on the second floor. He was actually at his locker, digging to see if he'd left any snack food that might have lasted the winter break, when a deep, gravelly voice sounded beside him.

"Hello, Dean."

For a second, he imagined that it was Castiel - it sounded impossibly like him.

But it was just because he had Cas on his mind. He reminded himself again, going up to the Celestine house last night was bound to have that effect on him. Cas had his head on straight these days, he wasn't going to throw all his hard work away by coming up to the school again.

Dean glanced up at the boy beside him and his heart skipped a beat.

" _Cas?_ "

Castiel was definitely there. He was focused very seriously on Dean, almost frowning as he glanced from one eye to the other, back and forth as if he was reading a book. "Yes," was all he said.

This wasn't happening.

"What are you doing here?" Dean slammed the books he was holding down in his locker and straightened up to turn on him.

"I am attending your school," Cas articulated tightly.

"Yeah, I see th - dude - " Dean stumbled for words. Why did it always fall on him to be the enforcer of shitty rules? He inhaled deep to steady himself.

"I thought you understood this concept after last time, Cas. You can't come here if you don't _go_ here." Dean rested a hand on Cas' shoulder, intended to comfort.

"I do, Dean." Cas was gesturing at his own torso now, and Dean looked down at his outfit.

It mirrored Dean's right down to the embroidered star insignia, although it was much neater - impeccable. Perfectly pressed. The black and grey tie was knotted right at his throat, where Dean's was loose as per the style of most of the students.

He felt his heart pounding. This was a new development.

"Cas," he croaked. "You didn't steal a Letters uniform."

Cas' brow furrowed and he just studied Dean even more intently. "No, I purchased it."

Dean closed his eyes, contemplated fleeing. He should have expected this, though; the recovery had seemed too good to be true. When he opened his eyes, Cas was still standing there, decked out in his school uniform, watching him expectantly.

Dean pulled out his cellphone.

"What are you- " Cas realised who Dean was calling and rushed forward. One of his hands gripped Dean's wrist, holding him too close. "No Dean, it's okay!"

Dean pulled free and stepped back. "I have to tell your social worker that you're here," he cautioned.

"They are well aware," Cas blurted, stepping forward and invading his space again.

"They know..?" Dean said blankly, too confused to pull away this time.

"I'm enrolled, Dean. Look," Cas shuffled, pulling out his wallet and pressing something from it into Dean's hand.

Dean took it, on autopilot. He managed to look away from Cas' pleading blue eyes long enough to inspect the thing. A small image of Cas' face glared up at him. It was a card. An ID card.

 _Academy of the Men of Letters_ was printed along the top, followed by the school motto, _Scientia sit potentia_. Castiel Celestine, student ID number 9073235.

"Yesterday - this was your surprise. You've transferred," Dean mumbled, still reeling. Cas was allowed to register at the school again?

"Yes, that is correct!"

Dean glanced up to see a genuine smile on his friend's face, a wide grin that crinkled the corners of his intense blue eyes and revealed a row of freakishly white teeth. He'd never seen Cas so expressive. Dean heard himself laughing before he even realised that he was.

"Cas, this is crazy! Not your usual crazy, I mean, it's -" Dean fished for the right words, but came up short. Cas' smile was very off-putting, too bright, and he was blinking against it.

"Good for you," he finished lamely. He was grinning like a dork.

"Thank you," Cas said, face falling serious again.

Just then Dean remembered that they were still standing in a public corridor, lingering practically nose to nose together. Thankfully the only passersby were from other grades, and seemed thoroughly uninterested in their little display of inappropriate closeness. He quickly turned away and busied himself with the contents of his locker again.

"I'm not in your homeroom," Cas carried on, oblivious.

"Yeah, I might have noticed if you were," Dean smirked. "Who do you have?"

"Mrs Ganem."

"Ah. You're with Benny, then."

"I want to be with you," Cas contended.

Dean studied him carefully, but the change from 'need' to 'want' assured him that it was just Cas talking. Just his friend, his best friend from before everything had gotten so fucked.

Cas he could talk to. He rolled his eyes so Cas could see. "It's okay, homeroom doesn't mean anything. We'll definitely have classes together."

Cas did not seem convinced.

"Besides, you've been away for what, ten years?" Dean closed his locker and clapped Cas on the shoulder, steering them down the hallway. "Just enjoy yourself, buddy."

"Yes," Cas mused, watching his feet. "It's good to be back."

They both had to make it to the science wing for next period, so they walked together, talking quickly as they did. Dean had so many questions.

"So how did you convince those asshats to fork over the tuition?"

"I didn't; I got a scholarship."

"....Letters doesn't give scholarships? My parents would have a field day with Sam if that was the case."

Cas looked smug. "I spent the past year convincing the board that I'm an exceptional student."

"Cas! What did you do?"

"I put together a portfolio. Won a few awards for being a 'nerd'." It was what Dean had always called him; Cas tried to mimic a winking motion at the same time as pulling air quotes. Dean almost busted a gut laughing at him.

"I can't believe that worked."

"It did. They waived the tuition and boarding fee."

"And the social workers, they don't mind that I'm here? With the horrible influence that I have on you and all," Dean smirked.

Cas tried to grin but ended up just showing his teeth a little. "I've been on good behavior, haven't I?"

"So you stayed away for two years just so that they'd let you come back to me for good, is that it?" Even though it was a joke, Dean felt a little shaky as he said it. His heart pounded harder. It was truer than he realised until he'd said it out loud. _Cas came back to me_.

"Did you miss me?" Cas teased, but didn't pause long enough for Dean to respond. "I came back because Letters is a great name. I'm a shoe-in at any university if I graduate here."

Dean nodded. "This is true. It really is worth it. Shit, I can't believe you got in for free!"

"I'm offended, Dean," Cas said, not looking offended at all. "I worked really hard to get here."

He wasn't trying to be serious, but it made Dean sentimental anyway. He knew the amount of resolve it must have taken for Cas to convince everyone that he had finally recovered. He was not the boy of tragedy any more. He'd turned his whole life around, taken it by the reins, in only two short years.

"I know you did," Dean said softly.

They had paused outside the physics classroom, as Cas gestured that it was his stop. Dean was supposed to go on to chem, but he was hovering.

"Well, I should," he nodded down the hall.

"Me, too."

There was a split second where Dean thought he would go in for a hug, but he stopped himself. It was very exciting to see Cas back at school, but being too affectionate might give him the wrong idea.

Dean would hate to be the reason Cas fell off the bandwagon.

"So, I'll catch up with you later," he said, backing away.

Cas nodded in agreement and thankfully turned to march into his class without another word. It was almost too easy.

As soon as Dean walked into his own classroom, he was flagged down by his teammates Benny and Cole.

"So I got a real sight this morning," Benny said with a smirk as Dean sat down.

That's right, Benny had first period with Cas. Dean would have returned the smirk, but he was wary of Cole's gaze on him, one eyebrow already raised in interest. Amusement at Cas' antics would only be incriminating in the long run.

Dean swallowed his smile, opted for rolling his eyes instead, which should lessen the heat on him once Cole got an idea of the whole picture.

He kept his attention only on Benny when he replied, "Yeah, I bet I know what."

"So Hot Wings did find you." Benny shook his head, chuckling.

Cole was already glancing from Dean to Benny, trying to follow. If Benny noticed, he didn't let on.

"I thought he was confused, sittin' in the wrong class. Was about to tell him you're over in Magnus' homeroom, but didn't get the chance. Then Mrs Ganem announces our new transfer student, 'n I thought I was hearing wrong. You realise he's _here_ here, right?"

"Looks like it," Dean muttered.

Sure enough, Cole could no longer refrain from butting in. "Who's Hot Wings?" he asked, already unimpressed.

Dean had to steel himself to look over at him, but thankfully Benny answered before he had to. "Name's Cas, he's an old classmate of ours."

Cole nodded, waiting for more. When Dean resolutely pretended he couldn't see Benny checking for an okay, he carried on.

Benny leaned back in his chair, casual in a way Dean didn't think he'd be able to muster right now. "He's had a rough go of it, but looks like he's back in the old Letters uniform."

Yes. That was a good summary. Thank God that Cole’s first impression of Cas wasn't one of the less complete stories that were available in the student body. And thank God for Benny, who'd been around since forever and apparently had boundless tact.

They didn't have opportunity to discuss any further, as Mr Sinclair was starting the lesson. And Sinclair had the greatest stick of the school up his ass when it came to students talking when he was.

But Dean couldn't forget about Cole's curiosity for the rest of class. It was definitely a sore spot because of past incidents, when Cas had met other members of Dean's group. But each of them had come around and learned to separate Cas' fixation on Dean from their actual relationship - that Cas had always been like a brother to him. For a short while, they were even foster brothers.

Still, this time was different, and Dean couldn't put his finger on why. Possibly because it had been so long? He hadn't physically seen Cas in almost two years. In that time, Dean had even discovered that he liked boys just as much as he liked girls. It was probably why Cas' tendency for physical affection bothered him more than it ever did before.

And, yeah, Benny was the only one who knew that he'd had a semi-regular thing with Donny last year. But Dean wasn't hiding it from the others for any reason other than convenience, and if Cas' antics ended up outing him, he honestly wouldn't give it a second thought.

No, it was the _dynamic_ with Cas that worried him. If people actually thought Dean was with Cas - or ever had been with Cas - well, it would just look like Dean was taking advantage of the poor, damaged schizo. And there was two things wrong with that assumption: one, Dean would never do anything to harm Cas; and two, Cas was anything but crazy. He was freaking _brilliant_.

Though of course, people like Cole would never see that.

There was no avoiding the inevitable, anyway. Only so much explaining could be done -eventually Cas and Cole would meet, and there was no way of knowing what Cas would do. Or what he might be doing right at that moment. He could be sitting in the back of his AP physics class right now, cutting out pink construction hearts with ' _Dean_ ' written across every one, as if it was Valentine's Day in kindergarten.

The plausibility of that scenario made Dean shudder.

They met sooner than later. When the bell signalling the end of second period sounded, everyone rushed off to lunch. Dean told Benny and Cole that he needed to grab something from his locker and to go on without him. Predictably, Cas was waiting at his locker. What surprised Dean was that he was squatting in front of the locker next to it, door ajar. He was piling books inside.

"Cas?" Dean asked as he approached.

Cas looked up from his work. "Dean," he said, nonchalantly. "How are you."

"Same as I was two hours ago - you know, when we last talked. Cas, what is this?" He gestured at the open locker. "That's Bates' locker."

"Yes. He didn't seem too attached to it, so we came to an arrangement." Cas stood, pushing a box into the top shelf.

"You traded lockers."

"Correct. And exchanged a small sum of money."

"Cas!"

"What?" He turned around, his gaze sharp. "Is that a problem?"

Dean faltered. He didn't want to offend Cas; he also didn't want to simply stand by if his friend was turning into a neurotic mess. "No, man, it's just-"

He closed his eyes, trying to sift through the bullshit sense of responsibility. Cas wouldn't be allowed here if he wasn't okay. It wasn't on Dean to keep him in line or anything.

"You don't have to buy your way next to me. You're here, right? That's enough."

Cas smiled, an almost imperceptibly small pull of his lips. "You're right. I just got excited, I hope I didn't cause you to worry."

"No, it's cool," Dean waved it away, finally stepping up to his own locker to dump his things. "It's just that Bates didn't smell so funky."

Cas didn't reply for long enough that Dean glanced over to see if he'd even heard the remark. Cas was squinting suspiciously at him, uncertain. Dean sniggered.

"Yes, I'm commenting on your odor, nerd."

To his surprise, Cas didn't strike out at him. "Ah. You're joking, of course. I am wearing your favourite aftershave."

Dean felt himself turn bright red. Of course Cas had found and purchased it for himself. "I - I don't wear that anymore."

He frowned. "But you still like it, right?"

"Uh-"

Cas leaned in suddenly, standing on his toes. One of his hands gripped Dean's shoulder to steady his balance. Against his better judgement, forgetting again that they were in a very public place, Dean inhaled at Cas' collar. His eyes fluttered closed. Warmth was just radiating off of Cas' body, along with a familiar scent that made Dean lean in for more. And it wasn't some perfume.

Then the heat was gone; Cas moved away again. Dean opened his eyes to find Cas watching him with his head tilted to one side.

Dean forced himself to speak. "Yup. Still like it." His mouth was dry.

He busied himself putting his books away, his face warm. Cas waited for him quietly. Dean checked him for signs of smugness, but Cas seemed sincere, as usual.

"I noticed that the mezzanine is closed. Would you show me where the new cafeteria is?" he asked, as soon as Dean was done.

"Yeah, next stop: french fries," he replied with a wink, but he monitored himself carefully as they walked. He didn't allow himself within a foot of Cas; he couldn't afford any more unintentional sniffing scenes in front of his teammates. It was just a fluke, anyway, he told himself. Dean definitely was not going down that road.

They navigated downstairs towards the lunch hall without incident. Dean helped him order food - Cas wanted the same meal he was having. Finally, both with cheeseburger plates, they made their way towards a corner table by the windows where Benny was flagging them down.

Unfortunately, Cas picked out Cole immediately.

"You're new," he observed. He reached across the table in an offer to shake hands.

Cole accepted, perfectly civil. So far. "Aren't you the new one?"

"I suppose I am," Cas conceded.

Dean felt a sense of futility when he realised that no one else could see that Cas was smiling. Being polite. To anyone who wasn't used to his muted expressions, he just appeared to be mildly irritated all the time.

"I didn't mean anything by it," Cole said, pulling back as if Cas had snapped at him.

"Cole is one of the best in his weight class," Dean interjected, more for Cole's sake.

"Wrestling," Cas repeated. It was supposed to be a question.

"That's right."

"Last time it was soccer," Cas said, looking back to Dean.

"That's in the fall," Dean replied, around the handful french fries he'd just shoved in his mouth. "You missed it."

"Do you wrestle?" Cole asked.

Cas fixed his gaze on him again. "I think I could."

It was starting to pain Dean, that Cas' deadpan delivery was probably giving all kinds of wrong signals. He laughed and clapped Cas on the shoulder for show. "Yeah, that'd be the day."

Cole followed his example and laughed, too; Benny chuckled from his corner of the table, and everything seemed like it was going to go surprisingly smooth. Bullet dodged.

"So, Castiel," Sid piped up. "It's been a long time."

"Yes. Sidney." Cas nodded in his direction. "It's good to see everyone again."

"I thought you were - you know, past the B and E."

Cas tilted his head, as if the new angle would confirm that he'd heard right. "I'm not trespassing," he said seriously.

Cole started to laugh, but the curiosity from everyone else at the table quickly silenced him and he glanced from Sid to Cas carefully.

Gordon decided to join then, resting his forearms on the table and leaning forward. "Are you even allowed to visit the school? Dean, I thought you'd gotten a restraining order on him by now?"

Dean felt his stomach drop. Oh well. It wasn't like it could have stayed hidden. He'd just hoped that maybe Cole would have a chance to get to know Cas before this crap came up.

"I'm not visiting," Cas insisted. "I've transferred."

"Yeah? Funny, I missed you in homeroom this morning," Sid replied sarcastically.

Of course Sid assumed Cas would be in their homeroom. But shouldn't that be proof that Cas was genuinely here for school this time and not just to see Dean?

Dean felt himself squirming and forced himself to stop. Shoved more fries in his mouth.

"That's because he's with me, in Ms Sands'," Benny supplied.

Thank God for Benny. Again.

"What do you mean? _Restraining order_?" Cole interrupted. He was staring at Dean.

"Gordon's being a douchebag, that's all."

"He does tend to do that." Cas spoke up, his gaze fixed on Gordon.

For a split second, Dean thought a fight might break out then and there, but Gordon just threw his head back and cackled. Everyone at the table was laughing. Dean chimed in nervously, eying his teammates.

They thought Cas was joking. Being _funny_. Dean had never been so glad to be the only one to read Cas properly.

Luckily, lunch passed without incident. Ness had been drawn into some drama with Lila and Ethan over the winter break, and it was sufficiently distracting to take over the conversation.

Cas just quietly ate his burger, refrained from joining in the discussion, and all in all avoided drawing attention to himself. He didn't even touch Dean once.

It was a miracle.

* * *

**_Then_ **

* * *

It was the Monday night after the four-day weekend, and most of the students were only just returning. Richie wouldn't even come in until the morning; Dean had to check with him so Cas could use his bed that weekend.

It was nice having Cas around. They cleared up the crap with Ennis easily, and Gordon's taunting just became background noise. Dean hadn't really checked with Cas' caregivers - he wasn't even sure who they were at the moment anyway - but no one had busted down the door looking for him yet, so he wasn't going to ask questions.

It would be the last time he'd take Cas' trustworthiness for granted. He really should have known better at this point.

To be fair, though, the whole visit was misleading - Cas had every intention of leaving tonight. He had his own classes to get back to. He seemed so _together_ , Dean was completely blindsided when it happened.

Cas was climbing in through his window, with paint up his arms, in his hair, exhilarated. It was the second time today - this morning he'd woken Dean up in the same manner, gone for breakfast with him, then disappeared again.

"It's done," Cas rushed, closing the window behind him. His breaths were heavy, like he'd run all the way here.

Dean just snickered. "Oh, right, that _mysterious masterpiece_ you've been working on," he responded sarcastically. "Where the hell have you been hiding away?"

"Fire escape from the mezzanine," Cas said quickly. His eyes were ablaze with excitement. There was paint on his cheek. "You have to come see it."

Dean doubted whether Cas had even slept last night, but he should have known. He should have recognized mania when it was right in front of him.

He just sighed. "You know I don't care if you painted the Michael or not."

"You still don't believe me!"

"Oh my god, Cas, it's fine. You _are_ a great painter, for a ninth grader. Just keep at it, you'll get there."

Cas groaned in frustration, and went for Dean's hand. "You're coming with me."

He was pulling Dean up from his desk, dragging him as he only resisted half heartedly. "Cas - I have to finish this makeup assignment or Ackers is never going to let me off the bench -"

"Shh," Cas hissed. "I'll help you with the assignment."

Dean scoffed. "I could have used that _twelve hours ago_ , but you just screwed off on me."

But he was following Cas across the room anyway. Cas only hushed him again, locking his fingers between Dean's as a gesture that he refused to let go.

"Why don't we climb out your way?" Dean sighed, going along with it now.

"The view will be better from this angle," Cas insisted, marching ahead in excitement.

They left the dorm, circling the main building of the school which Cas had roof access to when he used the window as an exit. It was probably a lot easier to cut across the roof, Dean mused, staring up at the top of the school. But Cas made quick work of their path, pulling him along at a pace that was almost a jog.

Dean was so naive, as they walked he only admired Cas' enthusiasm. He was so full of life, where Dean was stoic at times. As he followed him around the the back end of great walls of the gymnasium, he actually thought to himself, _I wish I could be more like Cas_.

Then they rounded the corner, and Dean's heart dropped into his stomach.

The whole wall was a giant mural of Dean himself, painted in the image of the Michael reproduction that Cas was so butthurt over.

It was messier, being such a grandiose version of itself, which Cas had clearly scaled the mezzanine to reach the full height of. There were gaps, as the image only followed where he could reach, from along one second storey ledge and trailing down both fire escapes that wound down the side of the building - and it was crude, in a way, obviously done in a mad rush, and Cas seemed to only have two tones to work with: white and blue. But it was _breathtaking_. He clearly had a god-given talent, to pull this off in less than two days.

" _Cas_ ," Dean whispered, his voice failing him. "What have you done?"

"Do you believe me now?" Cas demanded, a smirk on his lips. As if he'd just one-upped Dean in a dare game, instead of having graffitied about thirty square feet of private property.

It wouldn't be the first charge to appear on Cas' record; technically he wasn't allowed on school grounds at all, after last year's scene. But it would be the last time Dean actually saw him face to face for the next two years.

 


	3. Chapter 3

They only made it to second grade before the other shoe dropped.  Mrs Wilkinson was handing out permission forms for an upcoming field trip, and she had no more than put the sheet in Cas' hands before he signed and handed it back to her.  
  
"Castiel," she said, frowning.  "Your parents are supposed to sign this."  
  
He shrugged.  "I always sign them."  
  
Mrs Wilkinson's face fell as she probably considered that Cas' entire personality was the opposite of comedic.  It made no sense that he was causing a scene now.  
  
"This is not a laughing matter, Mr Celestine.  Permission slips are to go home to your parents," she insisted, holding up the slip.  
  
"My father isn't home."  
  
"Then, whoever your guardian is at the moment."  
  
"My brother is my guardian.  He is not home either," Cas replied, totally serious.  Everyone was staring by now, rapt.  Cas had never received a scolding before.  
  
The teacher was quickly losing patience.  "Who is, then?"  
  
"No one."  
  
"No one? No one is home?"  He nodded. She put her hands on her hips.  "Then tell me, where on Earth is your family, Castiel?"  
  
Dean could tell that something was wrong then, as Cas busted out the biggest grin Dean had ever seen on him.  
  
"Not Earth. Heaven," Cas said gleefully.  
  
Mrs Wilkinson didn't see it for the warning it was.  She just snapped, "This is ridiculous.  Up," she gestured for him to stand.  
  
Cas obliged, standing beside his desk obediently.  
  
"You will report directly to Ms Sands and explain to her what _this_ -" she handed him the form - "is all about."  
  
He took it.  "Yes, Mrs Wilkinson."  


* * *

**_Now_ **

* * *

  
  
Dean wasn’t necessarily avoiding the talk with Benny, but it wasn’t exactly by accident that they weren’t alone together until Benny actually cornered him.  When Cole discovered that Cas had never used an Xbox, not a single generation, Dean feigned some measure of surprise and decreed that Cas’ initiation commence immediately.  They stayed in the common room, with Sammy and even a couple of his friends, right up until curfew. Even then Dean tried to slink away unnoticed.  
  
Benny wasn’t having any of that.  He was waiting in Dean’s room, sitting on Richie’s bed with his arms folded.  He was risking the RA finding him here.  
  
“What’s up?” Dean pretended not to know.  
  
“Well, Cas, I guess.”  
  
“Unreal, right?” Dean tried.  
  
“Did you know?”  Right down to business.  
  
Dean shook his head.  “Just as surprised as you were.”  
  
Benny frowned, as if trying to choose his words.  “You haven’t mentioned him since the mural.  But you’ve been in touch, haven’t you?”  
  
“Emails is all,” Dean shrugged.  “And it was months before I even replied - you remember what a headache that was with the school board.”  
  
Benny nodded.  
  
“I was so mad,” Dean looked up at the window.  It was hard to look Benny in the eye while talking _feelings_.  “Being the ‘angel mural guy’ - you know I _still_ get that shit sometimes.  Especially Gordon, he can be such a dick.”  
  
“He knows better.”  Benny moved to lay back, looking at the ceiling instead of him.  Dean was grateful.  “Most people don’t know Cas, how snide he is.  But Walker knew damn well it was a joke.”  
  
“Yeah,” was all Dean could say in reply.  He lay down, too, putting his hands behind his head.  He felt a little guilty; he should have given Benny more credit.  Benny could ease even the most awkward of conversations.  
  
So it came out.  “Well, Cas did show up at my place yesterday.  I guess he was trying to tell me in person, but I sent him away.  Didn’t even hear him out.”  
  
“Hmm.  You were right to do it.”  
  
“Still feel like an ass.”  
  
“You’ve always been an ass, Deano.”  
  
Dean told him to shut the fuck up, but there was no sting to it.  After a moment, Benny asked again.  
  
“Are you worried about what he might do?”  
  
“They _sent_ him here, Benny.  They wouldn’t do that if he wasn’t totally balanced,” Dean replied, assuring himself too.  
  
“Yeah.  Sittin’ his own classes and everything.”  Benny only said it to commiserate.  
  
“Like, he’s got professional support.  He doesn’t need us sitting here biting our nails about his mental state, right?”  
  
“Yeah, man, you’re right,” Benny agreed.  “It’s not on us.”  
  
“Yeah,” Dean enthused.  He wished he felt half as sure as he sounded.  
  
Benny left pretty soon after that; Richie didn't even make an appearance until morning. He woke Dean up by kicking the end of his bed. It jerked Dean right out of a very intense dream where Cas was quite talented with his tongue – but whenever he tried to speak, Dean couldn’t hear him. He didn’t need to, anyway, the longer he kept Cas’ mouth busy elsewhere –  
  
"Rise and shine, Deano! You won't believe what resurfaced this morning."  
  
Dean had jumped upright. "The fuck, man?"  
  
Richie was holding his phone up, and Dean blinked blearily at the screen. "The Dean in Majesty piece. I've gotten it four times just this morning."  
  
_The Michael mural_.  
  
"Fuck." Dean reached for his phone. No one had bothered sending it to him, which was not a good sign. One message from Benny simply said _'Gordon.'_  
  
Richie just laughed as Dean groaned, reiterating the old, "You should be loving it. Cas made you so much less ugly. You can use this as your Tinder pic."  
  
Dean told him to screw off.  
  
"Your Grindr pic?"  
  
" _Fuck_ off, Richie."  
  
He did, cheerfully. Took up the bathroom for the next half hour, which Dean would usually seize as a chance to lie in. Sleep would not come back to him now, though.  
  
Dean could deal with this. First period today was gym class, where the only one in his group who hadn't seen it before was Cole. Without Gordon or the Campbells around, it should be a piece of cake.  
  
He didn’t wait for Cole to ask, knew he wouldn’t anyway; that much was evident by the way he avoided eye contact as Dean crossed the gymnasium to where three of his teammates had collected on the bleachers..  
  
“So,” Dean said loudly as he dropped himself beside them.  
  
Cole had to look over and greet Dean, casting a suspicious gaze.  “What’s up?”  
  
Dean bared his teeth in a fake smile.  “The ol’ masterpiece is going around again.  You seen it yet?”  
  
“You mean the giant Dean Winchester homo tribute?”  
  
Dean scoffed.  “Yeah, whatever you do, just don’t get into a prank war with Cas.  He’ll definitely outdo you.”  
  
Cole didn’t laugh.  Sid spoke up, though.  “Outdo?  You got your ass handed to you, Winchester.”  
  
“Hey, at least he got my good side,” Dean shot back, giving a Blue Steel mug.  
  
The three of them rolled their eyes, Cole made remarks about Dean not having a good side, and mostly the topic got brushed under the rug.  Dean counted it as a win, and just in time too: Cas appeared not a minute later.  
  
“Hey, Michelangelo,” Cole said, not as friendly as Dean would have hoped.  
  
Cas nodded at him.  “I don’t paint anymore.”  
  
“Really?  What’s the new thing?”  Ennis asked.  
  
“Gardening.”  
  
The guys gave amused huffs - the perfunctory recognition of sarcasm, a form of humour second only to sexual innuendo.  They thought Cas was joking.  
  
Dean knew better, only because he got lengthy emails about flowers.  Cas truly wanted to do beekeeping, but he wasn’t allowed to at the group home.  He was, however, allowed to have the garden bed out front, and nurtured only plants that promoted honeybees.  
  
“It’s quite therapeutic,” Cas insisted.  Dean was just glad he didn’t start on about the bees.  
  
“Okay, Cas, you’re going to put us all to sleep, come on.”  He gave an exaggerated groan, and turned to grab a ball for warm ups.  
  
Even if Cas wasn’t performing well socially, he could definitely prove himself physically - or at least Dean hoped.  It had been a couple years since Dean had seen him in action, and it was possible he'd gone rusty in the meantime, from all that studying.  
  
Sid and Ennis didn't have short memories, either.  
  
When Dean suggested, “Horse?” he got twin glares and a “Fuck you, Winchester.”  
  
Dean wanted to laugh, but in the same second Cas had asked, “What's that?”  
  
It was jarring.  Dean was accustomed to his memories of Cas being called out, though, so he glanced to his friends to see if they were as confused.  Sid seemed to be, looking right back at Dean with the same question on his face, but Ennis was laughing.  
  
“It was _Cas Says_ , with you.”  
  
As soon as he said it, Dean recalled everything - although “recall” wasn't the right word.  He had suggested the game because he knew his teammates would hate it; and of course, they hated it because Cas was so unbeatable that they’d named it after him.  
  
It was like a word on the tip of his tongue, missing until it was right there.  Like it was never actually missing.  
  
Cas didn't miss a beat.  “Ah.  Five points, you're out?”  
  
“That's it.”  
  
Sid piped up, “You're not the only one with trick shots anymore.”  He snatched the ball from Dean's hands and no one argued.  
  
He strode a ways away, stopping with his back to the hoop.  He called out, “One bounce.”  
  
Dean didn't really expect it to go in.  Sid often missed this shot, and he seemed too casual as he tossed the ball over his head and behind him.  It bounced.  It went in.  
  
“Lucky,” he jeered.  
  
“Interesting,” was all Cas said.  
  
Ennis was closer so he caught the ball but didn't bother moving to copy Sid’s throw.  He passed directly to Cas, no doubt eager to see if he could make it.  Dean knew for a fact Ennis would probably miss if he tried.  
  
Cas lined it up, standing in the same place and glancing back to study the distance before turning his back and throwing.  The bounce was right, the ball sailed for the hoop - Dean found himself shocked when the it hit the backboard.  Maybe Cas had let himself get rusty after all.  
  
Ennis and Sid were disproportionately happy about this, wooping and high-fiving.  
  
Dean took the ball next, trying an under the leg shot that would usually trip his teammates.  But he didn't even make it.  
  
Cole made a closer shot, throwing with his hands behind his back, which Ennis made after him.  But Sid missed it.  
  
Cas caught the ball, strode back out to the same place he'd missed from, calling out, “ _Sid says_ , one bounce.”  It was meant as a nod of respect, but Dean wasn't sure anyone took it that way.  In Cas’ grumbling tone it sounded so begrudging.  
  
Cas didn't even turn to watch as it bounced once, and went right in.  
  
Dean couldn't help himself.  “That's what I'm talking about!”  
  
Ennis crowed and clapped Sid on the chest, who looked dejected.  Cole swore.  
  
Cas didn't miss a single shot after that.  By the time Mr. Ackers called for everyone to gather for drills, the name of the game was once again _Cas Says_.  
  
Phys Ed was probably the best thing to follow up a fresh circulation of the stupid mural.  Of all of Cas’ talents, athleticism was probably the most effective at winning the favour of high school boys.  When first period ended and they left to hit the showers, Dean’s teammates were begging Cas to try out for the next basketball season.  Lauding his height.  
  
Dean guessed he had grown considerably.  With beansprout Sam as a point of comparison, Dean often forgot to give credit to others.  Anyway, he still couldn't contribute on the topic of Cas’ body so he walked ahead, pretending not to hear.  
  
Dean made a point of getting in and out as quickly as possible - not that he expected anything inappropriate - not that anything inappropriate would surprise him - he just didn't want to bait an end to Cas’ great performance in front of the guys.  
  
Cas, it seemed, was way ahead of him.  He was at their lockers when Dean arrived, books already in hand.  Waiting.  Here, instead of at the change rooms.  Maybe he really had learned a lesson after Gordon started making crap up.  Maybe he was more aware of appearances than he used to be.  
  
“Did you even shower?”  
  
The quirk at the corner of Cas’ mouth made him regret asking.  Dean’s face flushed as he considered just how many other ways there were to comment on Cas’ speed.  
  
Cas didn't answer.  “I have calculus now.”  
  
“Oh.  Not me -”  
  
“English.  Mr. Fletcher.”  
  
“Yeah,” Dean breathed, shifting.  Had he mentioned that?  One of the guys?  
  
“I'll see you at lunch,” Cas said, staring hard.  
  
“Yup.”  Dean knew he could say more, that with anyone else there would be more words.  He added, “Lunch.”  
  
Cas clapped him on the shoulder, left without another word.  Dean told himself to be glad.  Cas had learned to tone it down.  Way down.  
  
But Cas had not learned.  
  
-  
  
Dean should have known not to trust the Campbell cousins with anything other than stirring shit up.  It was kind of a good thing, in the end.  Dean had been in denial a little bit so far, about Cas’ ability to cause a scene. Christian Campbell was here to rectify that.  
  
Mark and Johnny had the entirety of second period to mess with Cas, and by the time lunch had rolled around he was an official member of their robotics team.  He was huddled with the pair of them and Christian, the senior of the trio, when Dean arrived at their table.  Christian’s grin was wicked as he glanced up.  
  
“Deano.”  
  
Dean remarked, nodding at the plans on the tablet in front of them,  “Doctor Badass is still going to hand your asses to you.”  
  
Ash Miles was a kid in public school - rumour had it, he was nearly nineteen years old and had long ago stopped actually attending classes - who preferred the ridiculous monicker Doctor Badass.  It bothered Christian enough, probably as a source of wounded pride, that Dean made sure to find excuses to use it.  
  
It was true anyway; recruiting Cas was a smart move, but Ash won every year.  
  
“ _Miles_ will have to learn to fly,” Christian accompanied this with a takeoff gesture.  “Cas is giving us wings.”  
  
Dean looked to Cas, who looked like a particularly bad smell had just wafted by.  “I have proposed a rotary system.”  
  
“Can you _do_ that?”  This was Benny, who looked more amused than truly skeptical.  
  
Cas narrowed his eyes at Benny all the same.  “It can’t be that hard.”  
  
“No, I mean - are drones allowed?”  
  
Mark and Johnny both shrugged.  Johnny said, “Nothing in the rules against it. Just power limits that make flight a pain in the ass.”  
  
Mark said, “Probably didn’t think anyone would be ambitious enough to try.”  
  
Cas looked at his hands.  “They might make a new rule after this.”  
  
“We’ll be immortalized.”  Christian sounded way too pleased, like maybe that was his goal all along.  
  
Dean just laughed.  He was way too relieved to see Cas mingling so effectively to think anything of it.  Gordon started bets on whether they’d actually be able to get the thing airborne, Colt agreed that they wouldn’t because he didn’t know any better, and Roy and Walt argued for a bit before agreeing with everyone else that they definitely could.  Cas piped up with etymology on the word drone as a male bee, and Dean distracted him with food to stop that rant from getting out of control.  
  
The whole thing seemed so innocuous, Dean let it slip his mind that they didn’t usually hang out with the Campbells outside of practice for good reason.  They were assholes.  
  
There was a lull at the table, and Christian struck out of nowhere.  
  
"So I am having a hard time figuring out who tops here."  
  
It took half a beat for the team to take in his casually explicit gesture between Cas and Dean. Someone sprayed their drink.  
  
"I mean, my first guess is that Cas would bend right over for you, but I don’t know these things."  
  
Unfortunately, Cas was faster than Dean. "Dean and I are not having sexual relations, Christian." Dean kicked him in the ankle and Cas didn't know that was meant as a shut up. "Why are you kicking me, Dean?"  
  
Christian leaned forward, drawing Cas' eye again. "If you were, then who would top?"  
  
"Your fucking mom, obviously," Dean snarled, pulling Cas' elbow as if he could keep Cas from engaging again.  
  
"He means us, Dean."  
  
"Does he? He must have some messed up fantasies."  
  
Christian feigned innocence. “Not me. Cas here says you guys are soul mates.”  
  
It was like the ground opened under him; Dean felt like he was falling.  
  
_Nothing has changed,_ he despaired. Cas was supposed to be past the soul mate thing. It was supposed to be buried in the murkiest memories of their childhood, from a time when neither of them really knew what they were saying. When Cas’ condition had fixated on Dean because he was the only person in Cas’ life.  
  
Christian must have pulled this one out of Cas. He hadn’t talked this bad in two years.  
  
There was snorting going around the table, but Dean couldn't register who.  
  
He knew he was supposed to manage this situation, but he couldn’t tell if he was supposed to shut Cas down or make a joke out of things. He stood from his seat, dizzy, words refusing to come to him.  
  
_Tell Christian to fuck off._  
  
Yes, he could pick a fight. He could haul Christian from his seat and pummel that stupid smirk off his face. That was definitely a possibility.  
  
But this didn’t originate from Christian. It wasn’t even just Cas’ fault.  
  
Dean needed out. “I just remembered I have to go.”  
  
“Where –” Cas was getting up.  
  
“ _Stop,_ ” Dean snapped, a little louder than he meant to. “Just stop.”  
  
He left the cafeteria in a daze, pulling out his phone and texting Richie because he didn’t know what else to do. He needed some weed. He needed it right now.  


* * *

**_Then_ **

* * *

  
  
Cas did not return from his trip to the counsellor’s office.  Dean knew that they were not supposed to be separated, that bad things would happen if they were. When recess came around and still no Cas, he went down to look for him, but Ms Sands' door was closed.  
  
Dean had no way of knowing that he would not be allowed to speak with Cas for the rest of the day, so he sat down and waited in vain outside Ms Sands' office.  Eventually they did come out; she spotted Dean immediately and manoeuvred between the two boys.  
  
Not before Dean could see that his best friend had red eyes and wet cheeks.  Cas looked grief-stricken.  
  
"What- ?"  
  
Ms Sands shushed him before he could even ask.  "Dean," she said sternly, "skipping class is not tolerated.  With me."  
  
She brought him to the office, gripping his wrist in one hand and Castiel's in the other.  Dean tried to meet Cas' eye around her legs, but the only glimpses he caught of Cas showed him staring dejected at the floor.  He did not look up at Dean.  
  
They were separated immediately, Dean left in a waiting chair for disciplinary, and Cas brought directly into the principal's office.  Cas glanced at Dean only once, his eyes rimmed red still and his face unreadable, before the door closed behind them.  
  
Dean was written up, received a pink note to bring to home for his parents to sign, and sent on to the lesson he was missing.  By the time he left the office, both Cas and Ms Sands still had not emerged from the principal's office.  
  
He was not at school the next day.  Dean marched straight to Ms Sands' office at first recess.  
  
"Did Cas get suspended just for signing his permission slip?" he demanded.  "That's not fair."  
  
Ms Sands looked up from her work, surprised, then sad.  "Dean... Castiel has had a family emergency.  He will be back at school as soon as he can."  
  
"What emergency?" Dean asked, thinking only of Cas' eyes red from crying.  
  
"It's a personal matter," she said gently.  She studied Dean carefully before speaking again.  "Dean, have you visited Castiel at home recently?"  
  
"Yes.  I was there last weekend."  
  
"And was anyone else there at the house?  An adult?"  
  
Dean shrugged.  "Of course not.  No one is ever home at Cas' house."  
  
She must have pretended not to be too surprised, because Dean didn’t think there was anything wrong.  She sent him off to recess, smiling and friendly as ever.  But that must have been the moment that the adults realised just how late this whole discovery was.  
  
It's not like Cas was clearing anything up for them.  
  
Dean didn't make it the rest of that morning before being pulled from classes.  His mom was at the office.  She asked him if he'd like to go visit Cas, if he didn't mind answering a few questions about Cas' house.  He was ecstatic.  
  
Cas was in a big building in downtown.  Outside had grand pillars and giant windows.  Inside it was clean as a hospital, but it looked much more like the lobby of the bank where Dean sometimes had to wait for Mom, with scattered sitting areas throughout.   Dean followed his mother, grasping her hand as he gazed around, down a hall to the side that lead them to the elevators.  
  
Up many floors - Dean got bored trying to count - and down another, smaller hallway with carpet and fluorescent lights, was a waiting room with a big desk.  There was only one occupant on the set of long bench couches.  
  
"Cas!" Dean ran up to him.  
  
Cas didn't shout in reply, didn't jump up like Dean would have, but Dean knew he was no less excited.  The corners of his mouth were turned upwards in a rare expression of happiness.  
  
"Dean," he said.  He looked up at Dean's mother, still smiling.  "Mrs. Winchester."  
  
"What happened to you yesterday?"  
  
"I signed my own permission slip," he confessed, addressing Dean's mom instead of him.  
  
"You can't get suspended for that!"  
  
Cas looked back at him again.  "No, I'm not in trouble for that anymore."  
  
"Of course not, Cas, sweetie," Mom said, too gentle.  Like she was scared of breaking him.  
  
"Are you here to answer questions too?" Cas asked.  
  
Dean nodded, but it was his mom who answered.  "We're just hoping we can help shed some light on things."  
  
She had to go talk to the lady at the counter, so Dean and Cas stayed at the couch, pretending to play with the toys that were there for little kids. They pushed giant beads along a maze of wires that was too easy to be fun.  
  
"Are you okay, Cas?" Dean asked quietly. He wanted Cas to be able to answer truthfully, and he always acted like everything was fine in front of adults. They didn’t understand.  
  
"You are here now.” They were holding hands.  
  
“It’s going to be alright.” Dean squeezed so he’d understand. “Mom says she’s going to get you out of here. It will all go back the way it was.”  
  
“Just don’t let go of my hand in there, okay?”  
  
Dean promised, “Never.”


	4. Chapter 4

_**Then** _

* * *

  
The social workers didn’t just take Cas from school. They took him from his house, too. In fact, the mansion and its yards were all locked up so no one could get in, not even Cas.  
  
Well. No one knew about the secret way in that Cas and Dean knew about. Still, Dean did not visit Cas' house anymore. There was no point, without Cas in it. Without anything in it.  
  
Dean didn't understand why, though.  
  
"It's part of the estate for now, honey," his mother answered him.  
  
Dean had to ask, "What's an estate?"  
  
Since Cas got suspended, he had learned a lot of new terms. 'Social worker' was the first, they were people who acted for the government when a child had no guardian. A 'guardian' in this case was not like the kind in Dean's comic books. A parental guardian was a mom or a dad or someone like that.  
  
They said Cas' guardian was a man named Michael Celestine. At first they had thought he was Cas’ father, but the investigation revealed that he was actually Cas’ older brother. Michael Celestine had disappeared, though, and everyone seemed to have thought that Dean would have some idea as to why or how - or, most importantly, when. But no matter how many times Dean tested the name, it sounded as strange and new as the word 'estate' did.  
  
He felt bad about that in particular. One of the social workers, Miss Missouri, had asked him questions about the house and about Cas’ brothers and sisters – there was supposedly fourteen of them – until Dean cried like a big baby. Mom stopped them and insisted that he wouldn’t answer any more questions after that. It made Dean feel like he'd royally failed Cas as a best friend.  
  
Mom always explained more clearly than Dad did when Dean had questions. She looked him in the eye while she spoke, so serious that Dean stopped tying his laces and just looked back at her. "When someone passes away, everything they own becomes part of their estate."  
  
"You mean when they die? Did Cas' brother die?"  
  
"Well," Mom shrugged her shoulders. "No one really knows what's happened to him just yet. Miss Missouri thinks that maybe Cas' brother spends a lot of time out of town, and he still might come back home any time."  
  
That sounded perfect to Dean. "And then Cas can go home, too?!"  
  
Her face said no before her words did. "I'm sorry, Dean, but that can't happen. Leaving Cas alone like this was not a good thing for his brother to do. He won't be allowed to have Cas back, if he does return."  
  
He still didn't understand - the whole reason Cas couldn't go home was because there was no guardian at his house. If this Michael came home, that should fix the problem. But he was 'not allowed'.  
  
Dean knew that there were some rules that didn't make sense no matter how grown ups tried to explain them. This was one of those, so he pretended to accept it.  
  
"Do you think Cas is scared?"  
  
"Why do you think that?"  
  
"I would be scared if I wasn't allowed to come home."  
  
Mom touched his cheek and sighed. "You are right. This is all very hard for Cas. But we're going to do our best - you, Sammy, me and Dad. We can help Cas feel at home here. Right?"  
  
Dean grinned. "You bet!"  
  
Except Mom was wrong that day.  
  
Cas did come to their house, with two social workers. They were supposed to leave, to leave Cas and just go. But by the time Dad made it home from work, they'd already gone, and they'd taken Cas with them. He was sick, they said, and he had to go stay in a hospital.  


* * *

  
_**Now** _  


* * *

  
Benny found Dean in the mezzanine just as the gymnasium below opened up free play for the rest of their lunch period. He could hear students filing in, creating a din that echoed up the walls and right over the railing where Dean was huddled against it.  
  
All the lights were off up here. At the end there was dark room with an amazing ventilation setup, where Dean meant to go, but it was locked. So he was just sitting here amongst random sets of bench tables, desks, chairs that weren't being used. At least it wasn't all under big white sheets.  
  
“Are you smoking up here?” was the first thing Benny asked.  
  
“Of course not.” Dean wasn’t that stupid. He had opened the old fire escape door that was shut off when the mezzanine closed. It was cold, and he had to brush the snow off the steps before he could sit, but it served. It was like a little balcony.  
  
Cas had once used it to paint his face on the wall outside.  
  
Benny dropped beside him. “Then you fucking stink, Winchester.”  
  
“Do not.” Richie had some really fresh dope today. The smell was so good, it could have been an incense.  
  
There was quiet for a bit.  
  
“Gordon asked Cas if he was trying to get into your pants.”  
  
“Of course he did.”  
  
“Cas said no. Christian said he didn’t have to try, that he already was.”  
  
Dean waved at him to stop. “If I wanted a blow-by-blow I would have hung around.”  
  
“You lost your shit,” Benny said, like he was commenting on the weather.  
  
“Yeah,” Dean breathed. He knew Benny wanted to know why. He knew Benny wouldn’t actually ask. He thought about telling him anyway. _I made Cas like this._  
  
Benny would just tell him why he was wrong. He would argue that Cas would have been worse off if he hadn’t had Dean when they were little. No one knew how long he had lived alone, how long he’d been taking care of himself by himself. Whether it was days, weeks, years, Dean was the only one who was there for him.  
  
But Benny also knew very well that Mom and Dad and Sam loved Cas, too. That Cas spent tons of time in the Winchester home before social workers ever got involved. He wasn’t ever alone.  
  
It was Dean who had encouraged this codependent shit when he was little. He led Cas on, because it was fun. Because having someone so devoted to you felt pretty damn cool before he could understand the concept of obsession.  
  
Dean had made himself the most important person in Cas’ life, on purpose.  
  
“I think it’ll actually be fine,” Benny said. “They just think it’s funny.”  
  
As if Gordon was going to let this slide any more than last time. But now it was nothing like last time. Dean couldn’t pretend anymore that Cas’ proclamations of gay love were completely off the reservation because Dean was capital S Straight and Cas was just his brother.  
  
Now, Dean got all hot and bothered every time he pulled one of his stunts. Dean was the one taking things too far, the one having wet dreams of Cas.  
  
He buried his face in his hands, groaning, “How am I supposed to deal with this? He follows me around like an imprinted baby duck.”  
  
“Have you tried telling him to stop?”  
  
Fucking smartass Benny. “You seriously think that’s going to work?”  
  
“Have you tried?” he repeated.  
  
So Dean tried. Man, did he try. But the next time he was face to face with Cas, it was so much harder than Benny could understand.  
  
Cas was pleading for forgiveness with his whole damn face. Cas, the guy with zero emotional expression. “I’m so sorry, Dean, I forgot how weirdly these boys fixate on the idea of sex. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen.”  
  
"It's okay," Dean said, although he didn't mean it. It was just a reflex when Cas was upset to tell him that everything was going to be fine.  
  
"No, you are avoiding me," Cas insisted. "And that is perfectly valid. I just want you to know you have nothing to fear. I would never try anything untoward on you."  
  
Dean's face warmed, if not at Cas' implications then at his weird language. "I'm not scared of you, man, I'm just - busy. I'm not like you and Sammy, I've got to bust my ass if I ever want a wrestling scholarship."  
  
"So you're not avoiding me?" He could see right through Dean’s half-assed attempt to let him down easy.  
  
"No," he forced a scoff. "Of course not."  
  
But avoiding Cas was all Dean knew to do. Cas didn’t make it easy. At least they didn't share any classes the rest of the afternoon, and Dean had wrestling practice in the evening as a solid excuse.  
  
The next morning, Dean skipped out on breakfast, only slipping into the cafeteria to grab a muffin just as the final bell rang. Then predictably enough, Cas was waiting at Dean's locker at first break, with a face as hard to read as ever and a too-casual "Hello, Dean."  
  
He didn't even touch his locker; he was carrying a pack which probably had everything he needed. He just stood there, staring at Dean. Waiting.  
  
They both had class in the science wing next. “I have to talk to Coach Ackers before chem,” Dean explained in a hurry. He dashed towards the gym, making it all the way there before he felt stupid about it. It wasn’t like Cas was following him, and now he only had four minutes to make it up to his chemistry classroom.  
  
He bought a powerade from the vending machine outside the gym and turned right back around. He was late, and he was given a pink slip for that, but at least Cas was already safe inside his own classroom.  
  
Then it was lunch, and Dean couldn’t get out of there fast enough. Cas appeared impossibly at the door.  
  
“Hello, Dean.”  
  
He nearly jumped in surprise. “Cas! Where did you come from?”  
  
“Physics,” he said, stony. He watched Dean expectantly. Of course he wanted to go to lunch together.  
  
No way in hell was Dean doing lunch with the team after yesterday - hopefully Cas would just eat with them anyway. “Oh, I just remembered. I have a catch up quiz for Mr Fletcher. I’m going to eat up there, you go on without me.”  
  
Cas stared. “Alright. I will see you in world history later.”  
  
He left. Dean let out a breath of relief – and then realized that Cas had just given him a grace period. History was his last class of the day. Did this mean Cas wasn’t going to stalk him until then?  
  
Dean spent another lunch period in the empty mezzanine with all the haphazard school furniture. He got a lot of homework done. He even found several balls that had gotten lost up here: volleyball, basketball, soccer. He made a mental note to make sure his teammates were coming up to look when they saw a ball go over the rail.  
  
Cas did leave him alone until history class. Dean was so grateful by the time he arrived that he almost went to sit in the empty seat next to him.  
  
“Hey, Dean.” Benny was behind him. “Do you know what this is?”  
  
He was holding up his phone, with a blank screen. Dean stopped and looked back at him in confusion.  
  
“Oh, thanks,” Benny said, too loudly to just be for Dean’s ears. He moved past Dean and took the seat beside Cas. “Hot Wings,” he acknowledged with a nod.  
  
“Hello, Benny,” Cas responded, unfazed by the Hot Wings, or by Benny taking Dean’s place.  
  
Dean understood, though. He dumped himself into a seat at the back of the room. Garth Fitzgerald the Fourth was across from him. He nodded at Dean, as if they had already established some secret exchange. Dean couldn’t remember ever talking to Garth about anything, ever, but he nodded back.  
  
He was going to be Dean’s new history buddy, after all.  
  
Then when final bell rang Cas tried to follow Dean to practice, and Dean had to come up with reasons why he couldn’t watch. Still, he showed up again after practice, to walk Dean back to the dorms, and Dean made up some big weight training commitment. He didn’t leave the gym that night until closing time, which was basically curfew, and when he finally dropped himself into bed, he was both exhausted and victorious.  
  
He’d maintained a boundary with Cas.  
  
The next day went similarly, and by Friday Cas stopped coming around entirely. Dean and Benny and Garth IV had partnered on a research project, leaving Cas to work with Richie and Jeremy, which essentially meant working alone. He spent his lunch breaks in the physics room for the Campbells’ robotics club, trying to rig a drone with the limited specs he was given. Dean spotted him in the hallways with Alfie and Inias, two kids in Sam’s grade that competed in national speed walking – and won. It was a weird point of pride for the school. Dean didn’t even know how Cas knew them, but he was glad Cas actually had friends independent of him.  
  
On Saturday Sam tried to text him about the whole thing, and when Dean didn’t answer he came around to the gym to corner Dean on a rowing machine.  
  
“Are you ostracizing Cas?”  
  
“What? No,” Dean huffed, slowing to a stop and glaring at him. “Did you come all this way just because I didn’t answer you?”  
  
“Uh no,” Sam pulled at his shirt collar, and Dean realized he was in workout gear too. “But it’s good to know you were ignoring my texts.”  
  
“Whatever.” Dean went back to work, refusing to even look Sam’s way for the next hour.  
  
That night, Sam was hanging out with Cas in the common room, and neither looked up when Dean entered on his way through. Good. Cas was almost a normal person around Sam. Some Sam time would be good for him.  
  
As for the rest of the team, Dean was suddenly too busy to really worry what they thought. He drilled them in practice until they were too tired to talk, and made straight for weight training as soon as they were done, when everyone else went to shoot the shit at the local pizza place. If Dean’s absence from their table at lunch was conspicuous, no one seemed to want to ask him anything. That was okay. He wasn’t even sure if Cas was sitting with them. For all he knew, Cas was avoiding them too and the entire team thought that the two of them were off necking in the mezzanine.  
  
But Dean was more productive than he’d ever been, at this rate he was going to be kicking ass and taking names at regionals come February. And Cas seemed to finally be respecting Dean’s personal space. So everything was working out anyway.  
  
It was just over one week of peace before Cas made another advance. He showed up in the gym just before the rest of the guys would file in for practice.  
  
"Hello, Dean."  
  
Dean cringed in surprise, not realizing that someone had been behind him at all.  Cas sure had a way of creeping up undetected.  Dean didn't bother turning around, simply resumed his warm ups.  
  
"Not now, Cas," he said as he gripped his right wrist and rotated it, counting silently.  "I'm still busy, if you can't tell."  
  
"Yes. Practice."  Cas spoke curtly as ever.  "Another period which constitutes- "  
  
"Being busy," Dean finished, switching hands.  One, two, three. . .  
  
"I too am busy, Dean."  
  
He felt his patience wearing thin, and stopped the wrist warm ups to turn and give Cas the best incredulous face he could muster.  
  
But Cas was decked out in full wrestling gear, solid black spandex.  Dean hadn't seen this much of Cas' body since primary school - and Cas certainly wasn't the pale, skinny six year old that Dean remembered.  He didn't have an opportunity to pause and take in the sight, though.  He started cackling so instantly that a pain sprung up in his rib cage, but he still could not stop laughing.  
  
"What's with the face mask, Cas!?" he wheezed.  
  
"Your laughter does not perturb me, Dean.  I have done thorough research on the safety equipment involved in your sport.  This device will protect me from breaking a nose."  
  
"Does your nose break easy?"  
  
Cas squinted at him.  "I have never had the misfortune, so I am uncertain."  
  
"Then you probably don't need it," Dean replied, unable to stop grinning.  
  
He also noted that Cas did not have much in the way of leg hair.  The singlet left no room for imagination, and just as Dean caught his eyes wandering, he managed to force them back onto Cas' face.  He was glaring, but seemed to concede.  
  
"Very well," Cas said as he removed his headgear.  
  
"Another thing, Cas.  You can't be here."  
  
"Why not?"  
  
"Our team reserved the gym.  You are not on the team."  
  
Dean felt like all he could ever say to the guy was what he could and could not do, and it left a nasty taste in his mouth.  Policing people did not come naturally to Dean; he was usually the one encouraging others to misbehave.  
  
Cas drew himself up straight.  "Then I would like to try out for the team."  
  
"Cas-" Dean rubbed his face in frustration.  "Tryouts are at the beginning of the season.  Have you even done this before?"  
  
"No," Cas said slowly, still frowning.  "I want to spend time with you, but you're always busy."  
  
"Yeah, that happens.  It's called high school."  
  
"I see."  Cas nodded but didn't move.  
  
Dean sighed.  "Look, I'll be done at seven.  We can catch up after that, okay?"  
  
Cas conceded. It wasn’t fast enough to avoid Gordon, Roy and Walt traipsing in. They were all about as amused as Dean was, with less kindness. And they had the good graces to inform Christian Campbell and his goons when they arrived.  
  
Dean drilled them all extra hard, and no one even bothered to invite him for pizza afterwards. He was going straight to weight training anyway. He found that he really couldn’t care less what they imagined was going on with him and Cas.  
  
He was even starting to forget why it was ever a big deal.  
  
Cas hadn't actually done anything wrong - and he wouldn't have said anything creepy at all if it wasn't for Christian freaking Campbell teasing it out of him in the first place.  
  
The guys could be douchewads, Dean knew that. If he couldn't weather some jeering from his teammates, then he didn't deserve to be team captain, did he?  
  
Maybe he could have warned Cas about the Campbells, and about Gordon. He could have had a straight talk with him about what kind of things were not okay to say in front of them.  
  
He could have helped Cas avoid this mess instead of walking right into it.  
  
Yeah, Dean figured, as he steered down the hall toward the Edlund House dorm, he could cut Cas some slack. He'd proven himself more than respectful of Dean's request for space, and it had gone on long enough.  
  
A truce was in order.  
  
Dean wasn't too surprised when he opened his dorm door to find Cas inside. After all, he had told Cas he would meet up with him after practice, and that was two hours ago. What was weird was that Cas was sitting on Richie's bed - no, in Richie's bed, curled up with a big hardcover that looked like a textbook.  
  
Dean ignored the pit in his stomach as he tried to make sense of what he was looking at. Sarcasm was always the first refuge when he felt uneasy. "Make yourself comfortable, why don't you?"  
  
Cas just kept reading. "It's not too bad. Could use some more pillows."  
  
"You could have taken mine."  
  
He looked up. "Really?"  
  
"I mean, at least you know me - what possessed you to take over Richie's bed?" Cas' answering look of confusion made Dean's head swim. No.  
  
"This is my bed," he said simply.  
  
And here I was just about to do an olive branch. God, Cas really did have Dean wrapped around his little finger. Just how gullible did he get?  
  
"Did you buy it. Like with the lockers?"  
  
Cas narrowed his eyes, no doubt picking up that Dean was pissed now, but clearly not following how that had happened. He nodded.  
  
Dean just breathed, “You are psychotic.”  
  
This time, he really believed it.  


* * *

  
_**Then** _  


* * *

  
  
Cas' hospital stay was six months, long enough for summer to bloom then turn yellow and red and fall to the ground. Dean was not allowed to see him this time, because the children's hospital was far away. Again, there wasn't much reason for what the social workers were doing to him, but Dean knew better than to ask, because the answers he got were the most nonsense he’d heard so far.  
  
The fact was, if you couldn't see a sickness, then it wasn't there. Just like the Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, none of them were real but everyone pretended they were around Sammy. Well, this time Dean was the one they were pretending for. Dean didn't know why, but he knew one thing.  
  
Cas was not sick, and he did not belong in a hospital.  
  
So, when Cas was finally allowed to leave to hospital and live in the Winchester home, when Dean saw him spitting out the pills his mother gave him, he didn't see anything wrong with that. Cas explained that the pills made his stomach upset. As far as Dean could tell, that was a pretty darned good reason not to swallow them.  
  
But Mom made a big deal of it. She started sitting Cas down and watching him swallow the pills. She would make him stick his tongue out, and looked inside his mouth before she would let him go.  
  
One night, Dean woke up after everyone had gone to sleep, because he had to go to the bathroom. He got into the hallway to find that someone was already in the bathroom. The door was closed, and a little yellow light was shining through under it.  
  
Dean walked towards it, sleepy, and just when he lifted one hand to knock, the door opened. It was too bright for his eyes for a moment, and then he saw Cas. He was wiping his mouth with his sleeve and his eyes looked like he had been crying.  
  
Dean was awake now. “Cas, what’s wrong?”  
  
Cas just shook his head.  
  
“Are you sick? Did the pills hurt your tummy again?”  
  
“No, I made them come back up.”  
  
“You mean you threw up? They did make you sick. I’m telling Mom, she shouldn’t make you take them anymore.”  
  
He had the hem of Dean’s shirt, stopping him from turning and marching back down the hallway. “No, don’t tell, please. I did it. I made myself throw up.”  
  
“You did?” But that wasn’t possible. Dean knew very well, because when he told Mom that he felt sick, she would only let him stay home from school if he was actually puking. If he could throw up on command, well… that was a whole new level of acting. “ _How?_ ”  
  
Cas taught him to stick two fingers into the back of his throat, which made him gag. Cas taught him to push until he wasn’t just gagging. Dean could see the pink of the strawberry ice cream he’d had for dessert tonight, floating in the toilet water with chunks of dinner.  
  
“Amazing,” Dean praised. “We’re going to have so many sick days to stay home from school now!”  
  
It made Cas smile one of his little smiles. “It doesn’t feel very good, though, does it?”  
  
He was right. They brushed their teeth to help with the feeling of being sick, and Dean held Cas’ hand, leading them back to his own room.  
  
“You can sleep with me tonight, if you want.”  
  
Cas’ eyes were big. “You’re not supposed to share your bed.”  
  
“Family is okay,” Dean insisted. “Sammy sometimes comes into my room when he is scared at night.”  
  
He seemed to be thinking about it still.  
  
“We’re family now,” Dean explained.  
  
"Like Sam?" Cas asked, but his face was all scrunched up like he wouldn't believe Dean if he said yes.  
  
And when Dean thought about it, it wasn't really the same. "No, not like Sam."  
  
It was the right answer; Cas' face relaxed. "Me, too. My connection with you feels different from Sam, from anyone else."  
  
"What connection?"  
  
Cas' hand went to his chest. With the other, he put Dean's hand to his own. "This one."  
  
Dean didn't know if it was the intensity in his friend's expression, or the feel of a soft, thudding heartbeat under his palm, but his own heart raced and he felt his face blush. He didn't know what to say, so he nodded.  
  
"I think I was supposed to find you, Dean. I'm supposed to stay with you."  
  
He nodded again. He didn't know what it was, but he felt it too. "Don't worry, you belong here now. This is your home, too."  
  



	5. Chapter 5

Something had snapped inside Dean. Out of all the ways he might describe the churning inside him, the most handy one right now was _pissed the fuck off_.

“That was uncalled for,” Cas had the balls to say, grimacing at Dean like he’d said something dirty.  
  
Ugh, but Dean _felt_ dirty. “Don’t. Don’t even start with me. Oh, I’m going to be sick,” Dean tossed his duffel down and it was like losing an anchor. He pressed a fist to his forehead. The whole room was stuffy, unbearable suddenly.  
  
Cas had done that. Had invaded everything, left no space where Dean could be free of him. Dean could not stand by and let that slide. He slammed the door closed, both feet planted firmly inside the room. He wasn’t letting Cas ruin his own goddamn room.  
  
“You were the one who said your dorm mate is the only person you get down time with,” he was saying, as if that equated an invitation to outright stalking.  
  
That’s what this was. Stalking. “ _Richie_ is the only one I get down time with, because he's the only one of my friends who's not on the team."

"I am not on your team, either."

"Cas - why do you think I dorm with Richie every year?" He didn't bother letting him answer. "Because I  _choose_ him!"  
  
He listened. Processed the words. “We can undo it tomorrow. Richie is quite reasonable.”  
  
“Reasonable,” Dean huffed, seething. Why couldn’t Cas see how fucked up this was?  
  
The answer was obvious: because he really was a crazy person.  
  
“Are you taking your meds, Cas?”  
  
A stony stare was his only answer, unreadable. Either it was offensive that Dean even doubted him, or this was Cas’ best poker face because he wasn’t goddamn taking them.  
  
“Where are they – all your shit is here, right?” Dean turned to the bathroom, went straight for the mirror.  
  
Cas was behind him. “Dean, stop.” So it was a poker face.  
  
Dean already had the mirror opened. There was a new row of little plastic orange bottles. At least Cas had them here. He grabbed a random one, something with a long, unpronounceable name. “Let’s see, take once daily before bed – it’s about time, eh, Cas? Go ahead.”  
  
He pushed the bottle into Cas’ face.  
  
“You’re not serious,” he muttered.  
  
“Dead, actually. Take it. Right now.”  
  
Cas’ hands took the bottle from him, although his face was still glaring defiantly. He popped it open, slapped a palm to his mouth, and swallowed.  
  
“Alright, just like Mom used to do. Tongue,” Dean commanded, taunting.  
  
Cas stuck out his tongue obediently.  
  
“Up.”  
  
Cas gave him a view of under his tongue, then moved it from side to side to clear his cheeks too.  
  
“Not bad. Let’s see how long you last.” Dean folded his arms and watched him.  
  
Cas just gave him a dark look as he put the bottle away. “This isn’t what you’re upset about,” he closed the cabinet, too calm.  
  
“Oh, whatever. As if that’s the only prescription you haven’t taken today.”  
  
“I haven’t gone to bed yet, Dean.”  
  
“Mmhmm.” Dean just waited.  
  
Cas stared him down for a good minute. Dean almost thought he was out of line, that Cas must be taking his meds, they wouldn't let him come to the school unless he was taking them - until he noticed Cas’ white knuckles.  
  
Cas was smarter than any of the group home workers. Of course he wasn't taking the drugs. He hated them more than anything in the world.  
  
“Just do it,” Dean sighed, stepping out of Cas’ way of the toilet.  
  
He didn’t bother holding up the farce a second longer, and immediately threw himself across the bathroom. Dean didn’t watch, but noticed the lack of retching. Just the sound of something wet and slimy hitting the water.  
  
Then Cas gasped for air. Flushed the toilet.  
  
Dean just leaned against the doorframe to give him the best judgey eyes he could muster as Cas washed his hands and splashed his face. “Feeling okay, Cas?” He sounded cold to his own ears.  
  
“This isn’t the problem,” Cas reiterated.  
  
It just made Dean loud again. “Oh, it’s not?! So you don’t have a full stock of antipsychotics that you’re not taking? How the hell do you think that’s okay?”  
  
Cas had shrunk away, his body language timid, but he held Dean’s eyes all the same.  
  
“How do you rationalize buying your way into my goddamn bedroom when I’ve been giving you the cold shoulder all week?!”  
  
He nodded once. “I should have realized you were avoiding me. That was my mistake.”  
  
“Oh, just that?” Dean shook his head and stormed back into the room. It was working, he did feel better. Like he could fill up this space with his anger. That Cas was the one who needed to leave.  
  
Cas didn’t follow him out. “I thought you were unable to make time because you were so busy, so I took it upon myself to find a solution. I see now that I was wrong. I should have asked first.”  
  
“Yeah, you should have.”  
  
“I wanted to surprise you.” Cas stared at the floor.  
  
“No,” Dean snapped, “You don’t get to do that.” He was about to ask, so Dean answered before he could steal the stage again. “That thing, where you act all cute, like all you want is for everything to go back like it was. We’re not seven anymore, Cas, you can’t just pull this shit!”  
  
But he wasn’t listening. He turned that meek face on Dean, with pleading blue eyes. “You are right. This was very inappropriate. I will go.” And he did. He started for the door, cowed as if Dean had actually struck him.  
  
No, all Dean had done was call him out on his bullshit. For fucking once. And Cas of course was overreacting, running out like he had anywhere to go after curfew had already started. “Cas, where are you going?”  
  
“To talk to the RA.”  
  
“Stop.” He did, so abruptly it looked involuntary. “You’re just going to cause a scene. I’m going to look like a major asshole.”  
  
“You had nothing to do with the switch,” Cas countered, and paused as if that gave him thought. “Which is precisely the problem.”  
  
Some part of Dean wondered. If Cas had come to him instead of going behind his back – hell, before Dean had opened that goddamn door, he was in the right state to say yes. But Dean couldn’t afford to think that way. That was what made him let his guard down around Cas, and then shit like this happened.  
  
“Yeah. It is,” he said, trying to maintain the same level of disdain even though Cas’ kicked puppy face was already draining the rage out of him.  
  
He was worse than freaking Sam.  
  
“Look, what’s done is done. We’ll fix it tomorrow. Just don’t even talk to me the rest of the fucking night.”  
  
Cas nodded. Without making a real reply, he made for his side of the room, giving Dean the widest berth he could. They both continued to operate in that peaceful silence as they took turns in the bathroom – hell if Dean was going to change so much as his shirt in front of Cas right now – and climbed into their respective beds.  
  
Dean almost asked if Cas had gotten new sheets, because Richie could be kind of gross, but then he remembered that he was giving him the silent treatment and shut his face. It took a whole fifteen minutes for Dean to forget the silent treatment long enough for one of his questions to make it to verbal form.  
  
“Why do you hate your meds so much, Cas?”  
  
No answer. Was he that fast of a sleeper?  
  
“Cas?”  
  
The reply came, just above a whisper, “I thought I wasn’t supposed to speak to you.”  
  
“You can answer me.”  
  
Cas did not.  
  
“Is it the doctors? You don’t trust them?” As extreme as he’d gotten tonight, now that Dean was calm he still found that he couldn’t believe Cas was truly insane. He’d always assumed the psychiatrists were just trigger happy with diagnoses, especially when it came to Cas.  
  
“No, it’s not that. It’s the drugs. They make me…”  
  
Dean waited for Cas to find his words.  
  
“Not myself.”  
  
“Like a different personality?” Dean whispered, embarrassed at how childish he sounded.  
  
“No, nothing like that.”  
  
_Obviously_ , Dean berated himself. Cas wasn't the victim of mad scientists and his life wasn't a drama.  
  
“It takes my spark away.”  
  
Dean thought he might elaborate, but he didn’t. “But what does that mean?”  
  
“It’s like - I don’t want anything, or feel anything, I don’t think or dream or – I don’t really create memories, either. Just drift through the hours and days like they’re all the same.”  
  
It got quiet. Dean knew it was his turn to say something. “That sucks,” he managed.  
  
“It does.”  
  
“Do they help anything?” Dean couldn’t quite get out the words  _Do they make the voices stop_. He didn’t even think Cas actually heard voices; but if it wasn’t that, he had no idea what their basis was for slapping the schizophrenia label on someone as down-to-earth as Cas.  
  
He considered the question for a beat. “I guess nothing hurts when I’m like that.”  
  
Dean could relate. That was what drinking did for him. “True that.”  
  
\- - -  
  
It was as if Dean woke up as a different person.  
  
He had fallen sleep with his back to the window, to Cas, but when he opened his eyes the next morning, the first thing he saw was Cas fast asleep in his bed. Richie’s bed. Dean never woke up facing Richie.  
  
Then again, Richie was the first person Dean had to share a room with, and boarding only started in eighth grade. But Cas was no stranger to sleeping in Dean’s room. When he lived at the Winchester home, they used to sleep a lot closer…  
  
Dean had a change of heart, waking up like that. Cas seemed so peaceful. And he had been truly repentant when Dean expressed his feelings. And he slept with the window open, and the cool breeze was the perfect balance to their stuffy dorm room. Richie always liked it way too hot. Now, Dean had slept through the night under his comforter, and man was it ever cozy. Maybe Cas wouldn’t be such a bad roommate after all. And god, did he look good with bedhead.  
  
If the guys wanted to make it something it wasn't, Dean was more than ready to tell them to fuck right off.  
  
In fact, in Mr Magnus' math class, Gordon tried to ask if there was still "trouble in paradise", and Dean delightfully told him where he could shove it. Then again at lunch, he decided to join the guys (Cas, notably, did not sit with them), and it seemed news of the dorm switch had reached everyone by then. Christian started on rules against students banging their dorm mates. Dean got to tell him not only to fuck off, but that he wouldn't tell the RAs about him and Caleb getting too friendly.  
  
Cole hadn't spoken to Dean all morning and Ness didn't look amused, but Sid and Ennis laughed, and that was enough for Dean. He didn't need his team's approval in his nonexistant sex life; he needed their commitment to sports.  
  
Benny was the only one who didn't take Cas' move into Dean's room as a relationship upgrade. While they were cleaning engine parts in mechanics, he told Dean that Cas had been hanging out with Sam and his friends Andy and Jake, all kids two grades below them.  
  
Dean was well aware, of course. "There's nothing wrong with hanging out with younger students. Christian hangs out with us instead of his own classmates."  
  
"Yeah, because Christian is as bright as a doorknob."  
  
"Point taken. But Sam looks up to him, too. He thinks of Cas as his brother. It's not that weird."  
  
"Still. You could cut Cas some slack."  
  
"Slack?" Dean put his part down to stare at Benny. "He's in my freaking dorm room, how much more slack can there be?"  
  
Benny shook his head. "He's avoiding all of us."  
  
"What, now I have to expressly invite him to sit with us lunch?"  
  
He shrugged. "You don't have to do anything. I was just noticing, is all."  
  
Dean went back to his cylinder, scrubbing harder. He didn't answer for a bit, turning the words over in his mind. "I'll talk to him," he said finally.  
  
"If you want to."  
  
Dean didn't reply. It bothered him all throughout history, because he sat with Garth like he had been doing all week. Cas was technically with Richie and Jeremy, but you wouldn't have been able to tell just by looking. They were both talking away while Cas copied from a textbook with a little too much intensity. He seemed to be okay, though. He probably preferred to do the work himself, Dean figured.  
  
Garth drew his attention. He was pretty good at that. He had, somehow, incorporated a sock puppet into their presentation. Dean and Benny couldn't say no.  
  
He was asking, "Will you be able to go to town this weekend?"  
  
Dean shrugged. "I have a lot of training scheduled this weekend. Why?"  
  
"Oh, me and the boys are going to hit up a karaoke club."  
  
That was a surprise. "You guys have fakes?"  
  
"What? Fake IDs? No," Garth laughed. "No, it's not a _club_ club. It's just a karaoke room. You can book them."  
  
"Oh." Dean was grinning despite himself. The idea of Garth at karaoke was tempting.  
  
"Regionals are coming up. Maybe another time," Benny said, answering for both of them. "You have fun."  
  
Dean might have actually disagreed with Benny, but Garth had given him a good idea. It would be a nice way to let Cas know that they were okay without having to get into a whole feelings talk. He had kind of crossed a line, making Cas swallow a pill, and he didn't know how to broach the subject. Action was much easier.  
  
That night, after practice and after his workout, Dean felt all weird about coming back to his room for curfew. _Cas_ was waiting for him there. It made his face warm and his heart thudded when he reached the door, pushed it open -  
  
The room was nearly pitch dark, if it wasn't for street lights in the grounds under the window. Cas was sleeping so soundly, the noise and the light from the hallway didn't even make him stir. Dean tried to enter quietly, using his phone as a flashlight instead of turning on the lights, and tiptoeing around to the bathroom to shower.  
  
He could invite Cas in the morning.  
  
But when Dean woke up, Cas was already gone. He showed up in the gym for class just before the bell rang, and finally Dean was able to go up to him to say hello. The guys wanted to do warmups, though, so Dean decided to wait.  
  
Sid didn't leave the two of them alone during the rest of the class, and Cas was quicker than ever leaving class. He wasn't at their lockers and he wasn't around during lunch either. Dean didn't know what to make of it.  
  
He'd never been the one hunting Cas down before.  
  
Instead of heading straight for the gym after spanish, Dean navigated toward their dorm at Edlund House, hoping to find Cas. He wasn't in their room, but he was in the common room, with Sam and Alfie, sitting around a table with notebooks and calculators out.  
  
"Hey. Cas," Dean called out. All three looked up at him.  
  
"Dean," Cas replied, nodding.  
  
Alfie barely spared a smile and a wave before he went back to writing. Sam just looked at him like _What do you want now?_  
  
"What are you guys doing?"  
  
"Math. Cas is tutoring us."  
  
"Oh. Cool." Dean sat down beside Cas, and Sam's look only got more pronounced. Dean defended, "I'm here to talk to Cas, okay?"  
  
"What is it, Dean?" Cas made it sound like _What is it, young grasshopper?_ He was obviously in full on teaching mode.  
  
Dean swallowed, feeling Sam's eyes on him. He focused on Cas. "I was thinking about going into town tomorrow to get some shopping done. Would you wanna come with?"  
  
"Town? You mean to main street?"  
  
Their school was in a little university town, and Cas was referring to the couple blocks that had a few banks and a little municipal building. "No, I mean the city. A bus goes out in the morning and just one comes back before curfew."  
  
"Oh. I see." For an excruciating moment, Dean thought Cas was about to say, _No thank you_ , and the whole world was upside down, because he was the one chasing Cas, and Cas had never felt so far away from him. But then, "Of course I'd love to go for an outing with you, Dean. You know how much I enjoy our time together."  
  
It was such a blast of familiarity that Dean forgot to even be embarrassed by it. He grinned. "Cool. Okay, I will see you later then."  
  
"Yes, I will see you tonight."  
  
When he got up to go back for practice, Dean saw that Sam was smiling, too. Whatever stick he had up his butt was gone now. "Have fun," he said.  
  
It was done. He had officially olive branched. Dean gave himself a pat on the back.  
  
\- - -  
  
It was a two hour bus ride, at balls o'clock in the morning. The school cafeteria didn't open for breakfast until seven o'clock, so Dean went without coffee. Holding a surprise for Cas was exciting enough that he wasn't even too grumpy with the early, caffeineless morning.  
  
It was Cas' first time going into the city, so he was excited, too, and it was pretty infectious.  
  
Dean brought him straight to the cellphone store, where he dawdled in picking out a new phone. The device came with a different contract than he had before, so he had to pick out new plan features - finally, the rep went to make the account changes for him, and left Dean and Cas alone at the display.  
  
"Here," Dean held his old phone out to Cas, who took it without a second glance.  He just focused on the new one in Dean's hands.  
  
"I'm giving that to you," Dean explained, trying to make eye contact.  
  
"Yes, I’ve got it," he said blandly.  
  
"Cas."  Dean put down the new phone and turned so they were face to face.  "I mean to keep.  You know, to use."  
  
"Oh."  Cas looked down at it.  "It's too expensive, Dean."  
  
Dean grabbed his new phone, waving it.  "I'm not exactly using that one anymore.  You should.  So I can actually get a hold of you," he joked.  
  
"We're roommates.  Why would you need to call me when we live in the same room?"  
  
He sighed.  "We're not together every second, dude."  
  
"We can be," Cas said quickly.  
  
Dean ignored that.  "Anyway, look," he said, reaching in to scroll through the menu of app icons in Cas’ hands.  
  
"There's games - you can get nerdy word games and shit - and all your social networking is here.  Uh.  I mean, email, I guess.  You've got the whole internet in your pocket on this thing.  And it's a pretty decent camera, too.  It's super useful - and Mom insisted on adding you to the family plan. Just keep it.  Please."  
  
Cas closed his mouth suddenly, as if he just decided against arguing.  He nodded.  "Thank you, Dean. I will have to thank Mary as well."  
  
Dean grinned.  "Let's get you a sim card, yeah?"  
  
"Yeah," Cas said distractedly as he browsed through the apps.  
  
He spent the rest of the transaction rearranging icons instead of helping Dean pick out his own service features.  He found the lamest apps from the bowels of the device, like dictionary and calculator, and placed them on the quick access menu.  Dean tried to be anything other than fond of the nerd, but he ended up with smug, warm cheeks despite himself.  
  
Finally they left the store, and Dean could get coffee.  He needed to use the bathroom, too, so he suggested a nearby café he knew of.  But Cas didn't reply, just wandering close behind him and presumably still playing with icon positions.  
  
"Are you even listening- ?" Dean turned around to look at him.  
  
Cas was holding the phone up to Dean's face.  
  
"What are you- "  
  
The sound of an artificial camera shutter went off.  Cas was smirking, one sided, an uncommonly blatant show of amusement.  
  
"Aw hell no, that's not why I gave you that," Dean moaned.  
  
Another shutter click sounded.  
  
He held out one hand to obscure the next one, and sure enough Cas took a third picture. This time of Dean's palm.  
  
"Come on," he pleaded, trying to sound annoyed. But he was laughing a little as he spoke. This was more like the Cas he expected. "Let's move it along, I gotta take a leak.  Bad."  
  
Cas finally glanced away from the screen in his hands, still smirking.  "Cafe, right?  Let's go."  He took another picture, just as Dean's hand fell out of the frame.  
  
"Dick," Dean sighed, grabbed Cas' wrist, and dragged him to the crosswalk.  He heard another click from the phone, which must have been pointing at his ankles now.  He groaned and shook his head for show, grateful that he was turned away so Cas couldn't see the way he was grinning to himself.  
  
They did stop for drinks; Cas mostly ignored his tea while repeatedly taking pictures of Dean.  A couple times, Dean tried to take the thing away from him, but by the time they left the cafe, Cas had found the volume control and was now taking photos silently.  
  
Dean could only be self-conscious for so long.  By the end of the afternoon, he didn't give it a second thought whenever he turned around to find Cas with his phone raised up high, staring intently at the screen.  It was his first cellphone; of course he was excited.  He'd grow out of the candid camera phase pretty fast.  
  
None of that bothered him; it was when they got back to the dorm, he was trying to sleep, and he was facing Cas instead of his wall. Cas was still on his phone, the light illuminating his face with a blue glow that made him the brightest thing in the room.  
  
Dean told himself Cas couldn’t be looking at the pictures still. “What are you doing on there?”  
  
“Sorting the pictures from today.”  
  
Dean felt a shiver. Cas really was just lying there looking at pictures of him. “I am right here, you know.”  
  
He looked up with the trace of a smile that felt so warm when it was on Cas’ face. “I know.”  
  
Dean wanted to make a snarky comment about Cas ogling pictures when the real thing was right in front of him, but he stopped himself. He wasn’t sure why. They were staring at each other now.  
  
_It would be flirting_ , he thought. That was why he couldn’t. Cas was so far out of bounds.  
  
Something lit his screen again, and Cas’ attention fixed on his phone so completely that Dean wondered if maybe they hadn’t been having a staring contest after all. It was pretty dark in here.  
  
Cas was typing. Sorting photos didn’t require typing. _Is he texting?_ But who would Cas text? Dean couldn’t ask what he was doing a second time, he just couldn’t. “One day and you’re already addicted to that thing. You haven’t put it down once.”  
  
“A girl from the home is very excited that I have this chat app. It was attached to my email account, I didn’t realize.”  
  
_A girl._  
  
All of Dean’s fuzzy feelings stopped dead in their tracks. “Who is that?”  
  
He had just never imagined it was possible. Cas was always so… gay. Not just gay, but fixated on Dean so singularly that he never imagined Cas had room for other people. Well – how many times had Cas said that their connection wasn’t like anyone else?  
  
Maybe that wasn’t intended as romantically as it sounded. Cas was pretty dismal at nuance.  
  
“Meg. Her name is.” He was typing, didn’t look up.  
  
“And she _lives_ at the group home? The one you live at? Why didn’t you tell me there are girls there?!”  
  
“It is not of import.”  
  
Dean felt awful, he felt himself hollowing out – he didn’t want to feel that way. He wanted to be excited for Cas. Girls were precious things at an all-boys school; with anyone else he would be cheering for them. Cas lived with girls, for crying out loud!  
  
He tried. “Uh, yes it is? You are so lucky!” But all he could think was, _Why would Cas never tell me?_ And the answers his imagination provided were not good at all.  
  
Cas scoffed. “No, I am not lucky. Meg is a handful.”  
  
Dean couldn’t believe he was passing up such a prime opportunity to crack quips at Cas’ word choice. But he never had to think about jokes, they usually flew out of his mouth before he’d even decided if they were appropriate. All that came out of his mouth now was, “Huh.”  
  
Because Cas had a girl who was a handful, who was texting him nonstop.  
  
“Look at this,” Cas was holding up his phone for Dean to see. His brightness must have been maxed.  
  
“Man, turn that down. How are you not blinding yourself?”  
  
“How do you do that?”  
  
Dean took the phone and turned it down. “There.” It was much more tolerable now, and he could focus on what Cas was trying to show him. Unfortunately, it was not the conversation with this Meg; it was a picture of him on the bus, leaning with his elbow in the window and sunlight streaming past his eyes at just the angle to give them a freaky glow. The green of his irises was bright like stained glass.  
  
He swiped for another. Dean immediately recognized the moment he was looking at; he had walked away from Cas at the bus stop to throw a wrapper in a nearby garbage can. Cas had snapped a picture of him from a low point, with undeniable focus on his ass. Dean quickly swiped back to the eyes picture. “How embarrassing,” he muttered, passing the phone back like a hot potato.  
  
“This light refraction is very beautiful,” Cas replied, defensive. “It makes your eye colour so striking.”  
  
Dean hummed and rolled his eyes. Cas probably couldn’t see that, though.  
  
“Ah, this one is blurry,” Cas mumbled, tapping his screen. He didn’t show Dean.  
  
Dean had a hard time falling asleep, trying not to think about whether Cas was just innocently deleting crappy photos, or getting his creep on Dean’s anatomy, or texting some girl who lived in his group home and who could probably have been sneaking into Cas’ bedroom and macking on him for god knows how long now. He ended up turning to look at the wall instead.  


* * *

  
_**Then  
  
**_

* * *

  
  
It happened the next night too.  
  
Dean couldn’t sleep because he was waiting for it. It wasn’t like Cas told him he would do it again, but Dean knew. He hated his medicine.  
  
When he heard footsteps in the hall and the click of the bathroom light, he got out of bed to head toward the sounds. Cas had already closed the door, but Dean could hear him spitting up before he was even close enough to knock.  
  
“Cas? Are you okay?”  
  
He opened the door before even flushing the toilet. “Dean.” His eyes were wet from his efforts.  
  
“Come on, Cas,” he said, disappointed. He flushed the toilet. “I could hear you, you know. Puking.”  
  
“You could?”  
  
“You should run the water when you do it, so Mom won’t find out. She will make you eat them again.” Dean turned on the tap water in the sink to show what he meant.  
  
Cas just nodded. Dean waited while he rinsed out his mouth and then he took Cas' hand to bring him back to bed. It was weird: Dean brought Cas to his room because that was all he knew to do when Sammy was sick, because sleeping together made Sammy feel better. But when they actually got under the covers, it was Cas who hugged Dean.  
  
It was pretty nice. Dean could understand why Sammy found it so comforting. Before he fell asleep, Dean had the thought that it would have been nice if Cas had been here when he was really little, back when he was still afraid of the dark. Cas' warmth against his back made Dean feel safer than anything in the world.  
  
But Dean was nearly a big kid. He wasn't scared of the dark anymore.  
  
Again, the next night, Dean listened for the sound of Cas waking up to go to the bathroom. He was very glad that he warned Cas last night, because this time Mom noticed. She came down from his parents' bedroom at the sound of running water and knocked on the door.  
  
"Is that Sam? Honey, are you alright?"  
  
It took a moment before the running water stopped and Dean heard the bathroom door open.  
  
"Oh, Cas. Do you need anything? A glass of water?"  
  
"No, Mrs. Winchester. I just had to pee."  
  
She laughed gently. "You don't have to call me Mom, but Mrs. Winchester is too much for me. Just Mary is okay."  
  
"Yes, Mrs - Mary."  
  
"Okay, go on to bed."  
  
Dean felt a little disappointed that she was sending Cas to his own room, but at least he wasn't caught throwing up his medicine.  
  
A little bit later, after Mom had gone back to her room and Dean was already falling back asleep, someone pushed his door open wide. Samy's little nightlight in the hall spilled, dim and blue, into Dean's room.  
  
"Dean?"  
  
It was Cas.  
  
He sat up in his bed and pushed his covers open so Cas could climb in. "Hurry up, I'm tired."  
  
They slept like that nearly every night afterwards. Sometimes Dean would go to find Cas at the bathroom and rub his shoulders when they walked back together. Sometimes Dean wouldn't even wake up until Cas was already done, when he tiptoed in and whispered his name.  
  
He always woke Dean up, needed to be invited before climbing in.  
  
He was always gone in the morning when Dean woke up again.


End file.
